


The White Queen

by KateLee11



Category: Troy (2004)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Drama & Romance, F/M, off-canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-22
Updated: 2020-12-13
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:27:04
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 37
Words: 80,992
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27152441
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/KateLee11/pseuds/KateLee11
Summary: No, it's not canon.The foreign queen of a tiny rocky kingdom is taken as tribute for Menelaus, but her only goal is to get off the beach of Troy and escape to the Northern Islands. Will Achilles change her mind?It's a trip around Bronze Age Greece with some love, lust, blood and betrayal - all the components of a saga. Caps are doffed to the Illiad and to Wolfgang Petersen - all errors and flights of fancy are mine.Originally posted on fanfiction.net
Relationships: Achilles & Patroclus (Troy 2004) & Original Character(s), Achilles (Troy 2004)/Original Female Character(s)
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14





	1. 1

Patroclus waited till Phoenix left – so late, he grumbled, his old bones needed to feel the comfort of his furs, not the cold sand of Achilles' tent – before he turned to Odysseus.  
"Tell us again," he begged. "Tell us of Agamemnon's defeat at the hands of the women of Kalios."  
His cheeks were pink with wine and the warmth of the fire, which had burnt down to embers, smouldering in the middle of the small tent.  
Achilles groaned and pinched the bridge of his nose to stave off his headache. They'd fought hard that day and men had died; they'd set the pyres and then withdrawn back to Achilles' tent to drink to the fallen. Odysseus looked over at his friend, who was shaking his head in mock-despair. His young cousin leaned forward and slapped Odysseus' leg.  
"Tell," he said.  
"Cousin," Achilles said, "we have heard this story a dozen times."  
"And with every telling it gets better!" Patroclus said, ebullient with wine.

"Don't you have a woman waiting for you?" Achilles asked slyly, glancing at Odysseus.  
Patroclus had finally taken a concubine but she, a dark-eyed Syrian, was driving him to despair. He had not yet learned how to control his woman and she was most definitely controlling him. When the boy went outside to relieve himself, Achilles had murmured to Odysseus that she'd thrown him out of their tent and told him not to come back, something the older man had found amusing. Patroclus was finally one of the Myrmidons, but he still had much to learn. He could fight a man and win, Odysseus thought with a grin, but he didn't know what weapons to use with a woman.

Patroclus looked at the two men, stricken at the thought of the angry woman seething in his bed, and Odysseus smothered a laugh. He took pity on him.  
"Very well, then, the story of how the King of Kings was defeated by the White Queen of Kalios," Odysseus said. He leaned back against one of the tent posts and wished, for the umpteenth time, that these gatherings could take place in his tent, where there were seats for all and comfortable rugs. Yet, without fail, they always seemed to end up on the hard ground of Achilles tent, which smelled of blood, sweat and leather, and not the healing herbs Odysseus had burning in his. How it happened this way had been a mystery to him till he recognised that Achilles did not care enough for anyone to go to anyone. He simply assumed that they would all come to him.  
And, curse the man, they all did.

Patroclus leaned forward.  
"Aye, well, when you lot took off to Pedasus, the Kalion King died," Odysseus began, as he always did.  
"The woman-king," Patroclus said, nodding enthusiastically. "Married to the man-queen."  
"They say," Odysseus said, "that he wore the robes of a woman and lay with his lover, while his Queen rode into battle on a black horse, a huge black horse, that galloped like thunder through the battlefield, cutting men down as she went. She had six dogs as big as mountain lions, big enough to take down wolves, they said."  
Achilles snorted.  
"I'm just saying what I heard," Odysseus insisted, shrugging. "That's what they say."  
Achilles rolled his eyes and drank deep.  
"But you saw her," Patroclus insisted.  
Odysseus held up a hand. "Many years ago, young friend, at a gathering of the kings. They were barely married then and she wore the fine clothes of the Kalion, kept her eyes down and her mouth shut. No horse, no dogs."  
"As befits a woman," Achilles said slyly, poking his cousin with his foot. "Take note."

Patroclus ignored him. "What did the king die of, then?" he asked, though he knew the answer.  
"No one knows how or of what. For sure, he was not a young man but he was healthy and strong. But a fever or ague took him and to his wife's great sorrow, and the greater sorrow of all his subjects, he succumbed and died. Agamemnon decided it would be fortuitous to attack Kalios – they have salt, after all, and God knows we could do with salt. Three years here and no sign of an end to this siege; our salt supplies are waning faster than we can replenish them. And what harm? Agamemnon said. The king's brother and heir had not yet returned to the city from his wife's home, so Kalios was practically inviting invasion."

Odysseus smiled at the young man and shrugged. "The signs seemed to point to it: an eagle flew overhead with a snake in its beak, so a watchman said. This was enough to convince our King of Kings. But the same day, a wolf – a lone wolf – crept into camp and killed a ram."  
"A she-wolf," Patroclus insisted.  
"Male or female, who knows?" Odysseus replied. "But that's what they call the Queen of Kalios: the she-wolf. Nestor told Agamemnon that the gods had sent a she-wolf into the thick of our camp and she'd slaughtered a ram, a fine ram. But that drove him into a temper: how dare Nestor attach significance something he would rather overlook? Against all of our advice, the signs of the gods and ignoring the honour of the funeral rights, Agamemnon set off to capture Kalios."  
"While it was weak," Patroclus prompted.  
"While he thought it was weak," Odysseus corrected. "I told him, nay I implored him to wait for the return of the two best warriors in camp –" Patroclus grinned " – but he would not hear of it. Kalios: a tiny kingdom on a rocky cliff? He could take it in an hour, he roared. So we set sail, just a small force. After all, it would be beneath his honour to attack such an insignificant city with a significant army, so he picked a few of the leaders he tolerates best and we took a jaunt across the water – to flex our muscles, he said. That's what he called it: flexing our muscles. At first the gods seemed to smile on us; the winds were in our favour and we sliced through the water like a knife – "  
"- cutting through bread," Patroclus finished.

"You've heard this story too often," chided Achilles. He reached for the wine jug.  
He was, Odysseus noted, pretending not to care for the tale, but he had known the Myrmidon long enough to see how he watched him from the corner of his eye, following his every word.

Satisfied he had a captive audience, Odysseus leaned back against the hard post.  
"We arrived at a beach that was nothing but a waste of pebbles, in a tiny bay not big enough for our ships. Of course, we knew that Kalios was famed for its stony beaches, its fortress, but it's one thing to hear of a shitty little kingdom on a rocky outpost and another to actually land there. Agamemnon's chariot had to be carried across the beach to the road and there he discovered that the road to the city runs almost vertically up their damned cliff to the city gates."  
Odysseus laughed, a deep, hoarse laugh that made even Achilles smile.  
"Aye, he had a face as sour as spoiled milk on him then. And he had no choice but to climb that hill, huffing and puffing, his face as red as a lobster, followed by all of his men. By this time, the clouds were gathering like an omen and the men were already discontent. Some started to murmur that the place was cursed: they had left the beach of Troy in sun, arrived but days later to darkness. Agamemnon was attacking a city during the king's funeral rites – the gods were watching and showing their disfavour."  
Patroclus nodded.

"We got to the gates and Agamemnon caught his breath – "  
Odysseus mimicked the older man clutching his side, drawing air in deeply.  
"- Then he roared, 'Queen of Kalios! I am Agamemnon, King of Kings! Look upon my army and despair!' But there was no response. Not a single figure on the ramparts. Not a soldier, not a lookout. Just that damned door, high as ten men, and those stony walls. His face grew redder still and he screeched, 'Queen of Kalios! Queen of Kalios!' It echoed about the cliffs – for the city is built into the cliffs, the houses are hewn from the very rock, I swear – and then finally, just as he was giving the order for the troops to attack that accursed gate – she appeared on the ramparts."  
"What did she look like?" Patroclus asked eagerly. "She was beautiful, no?"  
"Like I've said before," Odysseus smiled, "I could not tell. When I saw her years ago, she wore a veil."  
"They say she is beautiful," the young Myrmidon said in a wistful tone.  
"They say she looks strange and outlandish. Some say she is an Amazon because she fights like a man. Others yet say she comes from the far north, where the people have hair the colour of orange fruit and skin that shimmers blue. I saw not orange hair, nor blue skin. Rather, she is very pale. Looks half-dead, some say."

Patroclus looked disappointed, as he always did at that point in the story, and Odysseus felt a little sorry for him.

"She was very regal," he said. "She wore white and she was, in fact, pale like the moon. She stood on the ramparts and shouted, 'Why are you here?' at our king. He called up to her to surrender or he would take the city by force. He said he knew that they were weak, that the king's guard had gone forth to fetch the heir and the city was guarded by only their auxiliary. He shouted, 'Surrender or I will attack!' and we rattled our swords and roared, to put the fear of the gods in to the Kalion Queen."

Achilles stirred and Odysseus looked up.  
The tent was in darkness, save the light from the fire. He saw the two blond heads of the cousins draw near, waiting on his next words.  
"She just looked down on us and smiled. 'Attack!' she called and inclined her head."  
He leaned forward, sure of his audience's attention, bowing his head briefly.  
"Agamemnon, flustered, blustered and shook his sword. He gave his order to attack, then their archers stood. They had been perched behind the walls, like little birds. As soon as we made a move, the arrows came down like hail. The Phylaceans made it to the gate, but on them they rained down rocks, stones, pots and plates, balls of burning rags, dipped in tar. Every single inch of those ramparts were taken up with Kalions: the archers stood behind small children who dropped every piece of shit they had on hand – "  
"And shit, they actually dropped shit," Patroclus cried.  
"Aye, they emptied pots of faeces and piss, oil and stagnant water – every foul-smelling mixture you can imagine – on the heads of the men below. And the women howled. They stood by the men, howling like animals, like wolves, and threw stones and rocks."

Achilles sighed and wearily rubbed the skin between his eyes.  
"Then the heavens rumbled and broke open. It grew darker still and lightning flashed from the sky. The men became uneasy, they were caught in the narrow ravine leading to the city gates and some murmuring started that they were like chickens to a fox: easy prey. What if the Kalion army were waiting, hiding, to bring up the rear from the beaches? What if this was a ruse to drive them towards the city for the slaughter?"

Odysseus looked from one set of blue eyes to the other.  
"So I told my men to pull back, and Ajax told his to do the same. The other leaders pulled back quickly enough and then, finally, Agamemnon huffed and puffed back down the hill, slipping and sliding in the torrential rain. We convened on the beaches, considered making camp and waiting it out, but there was nowhere to pitch the tents, no fresh water, and it was already as dark as Hades. Ajax figured the winds would drive us back towards Troy, so we cut our losses and set back across an angry sea to the sandy beaches of our new home."

Patroclus clapped, his young face bright with mischievous delight.  
"And Agamemnon cursed her, cursed her name, her ancestors and her offspring," he said.  
"He did. Nestor tried to calm him, as did Phoenix. Beneath his dignity, they reminded him, beneath his dignity to get so worked up about a city so unimportant. Kalios is far from here, it has little culture or influence. All it has is its salt mine and even that barely kept the king in gold. But, no, now he has added Kalios to the list of enemies that have wronged him and, mark my words, he will have us all set off again some day to take those city gates. That's something to look forward to, my friend," he grinned at Achilles.

Achilles stretched.  
"I cannot wait," he answered, deadpan. "These are the battles that make us immortal. A blue-skinned queen and little children with buckets of piss."  
He smiled his crooked half-smile and raised his goblet at his friend.

Odysseus stood and saluted the two.  
"I take my leave," he said. "I shall have the women pour me a bath tomorrow, but for now I intend to fall into the slumber of the dead, happy in my own filth."  
"And I will return to my woman," Patroclus said, brave words that belied his nervous tone.  
"At least she's no she-wolf," Achilles said, holding back the leather curtain that functioned as a door.

Patroclus laughed and stumbled off in the darkness. Odysseus went in the opposite direction, back to camp.  
But in his mind's eye, he saw the White Queen, pale as ivory in the sleeting grey storm. When he turned to leave, he had looked back and looked up.  
The ramparts were empty again, the men, women and children had melted away, as though they'd never been there. Only she stood in the streaming rain, her robes flapping in the wind.

As he looked at her, she seemed to look straight at him: she nodded her head, eyes cast downwards, as he remembered her from the gathering of kings, then stood like that, motionless, till the injured and dead were gathered and removed down to the beach.  
He had shuddered, pulling his cloak closer as he stumbled down the pebbled path to the waiting ships.


	2. 2

Six Months Later

"No," Achilles said. He pulled the straps on his grieves and adjusted them, pulling the strap again.  
Odysseus leaned against the door-frame.  
"It's not a request, it's a command, friend," he said.  
"Tell Agamemnon – "  
"I will tell him nothing, you tell him yourself."  
"I have gone nearly a full moon without seeing the man," Achilles said. "And we have both been the happier for it."  
Ahma held up his shield and Achilles took it, examining it with mock-care. He pointed at a dark smudge and sternly said, "Ahma!"  
She slapped his arm and shook her fist at him. Achilles laughed, one of his rare, husky laughs.

Odysseus shook his head and grinned.  
The man had had a string of slaves in and out of his tent, but unlike most of the other warriors, he hadn't taken a concubine.  
The closest he had to any kind of permanent fixture by his hearth was an ancient Abyssinian woman, a dark, toothless woman they called Ahma, which Odysseus knew to mean grandmother or old woman. She had been taken by a raiding party from a Thracian town, probably a slave far from home to begin with. Why any soldier might have been moved to take an old crone back to Troy was quite beyond Odysseus, but he suspected that she had inveigled her way around the tip of a sword and onto an Achaean ship: once of the beaches of Troy, she had somehow attached herself to Achilles, who had accepted her tending with bemusement. The old woman bustled in and out of his tent with platters of food, baskets of bread and jugs of hot water, cleaning his armour, his clothing. She shoved him aside when he stood in her way and scolded him in her own language when he threatened to have her beaten for insolence.  
In front of the Myrmidons, she was meek, invisible, but in Achilles' tent, she pushed him around and he let her do it.

Ahma played dumb when Odysseus addressed her in Greek, answering him in her own tongue, her shoulders hunched in abeyance, but he was absolutely certain that she understood every word.  
When Achilles returned from battle, she cleaned his wounds and they argued about which herbs to use, each in his own language, ignoring the other: she scrunched up her tiny nose, making more lines spread across her dark skin, sniffing his dried plants distastefully. She had a selection of foul pastes she liked to use on his skin and sometimes, battle-weary, he could not face another fight and simply let her have her way. It made Odysseus laugh to see his friend stretched out, naked to his loincloth, on the floor of his tent with the little woman smearing some rank-smelling gunk on his wounds. 

But Odysseus had seen her push his hair back, comb it and plait it with the kind of tenderness he'd seen his wife Penelope show his son. Something about the way Ahma treated Achilles – the scolding, the smacks on his wrists, the choice picks of meat she pulled out from under the other handmaidens' fingers, the proud way she regarded him when he ascended his chariot in his black and gold armour – made Odysseus understand why he kept her around.

"Agamemnon has a task for us," Odysseus said. "He wants us to return to Kalios."  
Achilles took up a helmet, then handed it to Ahma.  
"Not this one, one for practice," he said to her and then turned to Odysseus.  
"To what end?" he asked coldly. "Has he found a way to break down their gate? Smash their walls? Has he spent the past six months devising a way to break through their barricade of piss pots and thunder storms?"  
"The new king wishes to make peace," Odysseus replied. "He sent emissaries and a plethora of gifts. He would like to negotiate a treaty."  
Achilles glanced up at him, surprised. "Why?"  
"He has no stomach for war," his friend said drily. "He has probably realised that his choice is to face besiegement or defeat. Kalios isn't like Troy: they don't have the resources to stay behind their rocky walls for three months, let alone three years. So he wants to ward off Agamemnon's wrath with a treaty."  
"And what of your she-wolf, the old queen?"  
"The emissaries won't say what has become of her," Odysseus said. He stood aside to let Ahma pass. She made sure to give him a tiny push with her elbow as she went; just a nudge – a reminder of the hierarchy of importance in Achilles' tent.  
"Dead?" Achilles said, standing upright.  
"Probably. She was a popular queen, despite being a foreigner – "  
"A blue-skinned foreigner – "  
"Aye, indeed, so Agamemnon believes they probably had her killed. Her girl-child has also disappeared. Of course, it's one thing to kill a widow-queen to ensure the succession, but killing an innocent child is something else. Either way, the new king wants a peace treaty and the she-wolf is gone. If that's what you're afraid of," he added, pretending to study his nails.  
Achilles turned to him, shaking his head.  
"I tremble," he said sardonically.

Odysseus laughed and slapped his friend on the shoulders.  
Achilles trained every day: his arms and back were hard, the muscles burnt brown by the sun. Ahma had tied his hair back with leather straps, but some of the strands had escaped and fell around his face.  
Odysseus smiled at him: Achilles was blessed by the gods, his skin and hair were shades of gold and bronze, smooth and warm. He looked like he had been cast from metal; even covered in a lattice of scars, even with his skin roughened by years of sand and stone, he still looked like he might have stepped down from Olympus. When Achilles walked through camp, his head whipping around to see who was coming, who was leaving, the women stopped and stared, nudging each other as he passed.  
Odysseus sometimes wished he had that effect on the women: certainly, his wife Penelope was the only one he truly loved, but it would have been nice, nonetheless, to be the object of a little open-mouthed adoration from other women from time to time. Achilles took it for granted; it was his birthright.

"Agamemnon wants to send us both," Odysseus said. "He orders you to his tent so he can tell us what he wants from the Kalions."  
"Both of us? I wonder why," growled Achilles. "You bring brains, I swing sword. You sweet-talk the Kalions into submission and I go along to make sure you don't follow the old queen's path to Hades."  
"Something like that," Odysseus said. "Though, to be sure, I will let you take the lead in negotiations if that is what you have a mind to do."

Achilles snorted, shooting his friend a crooked grin.  
"I would rather cut my way through a dozen men than drink wine and honey-talk a cowardly king. No, old friend, you have your tricks and I have my sword. We play with the toys the gods give us, isn't that right?"  
"So you'll come, then?"  
"I'll go with you, Odysseus. I will not go for the King of Kings and I will not meet with him to get my orders. You go and let him educate you in what he wants; my men and I will be waiting by the ships."  
Odysseus bent his head, sighing deeply.  
"Very well," he conceded. "I will meet with the Agamemnon."  
He pushed back the leather curtain, but as he did, Ahma poked her head in.  
"Ah!" she cried, affronted, and stomped past, glaring at him.  
"That woman," Odysseus said to Achilles. "She is your Cerberus, I swear."  
Achilles laughed out loud.  
"I will meet you at the ships," he said. "Give me word when you wish to sail."

Odysseus stepped out into the hot sun, a smile breaking across his lips.  
Once again he had avoided a confrontation between the two proudest, most bull-headed men in camp – and, even better, he might even manage to get the Myrmidons on their ships and on the way to Kalios without Agamemnon and Achilles breaking their month-long silence. He rubbed his hands in satisfaction and headed for the tent of the King of Kings.


	3. 3

Relta shivered.  
Adrenalin was shooting through her body, from her toes – which were tapping against the marble floor of the temple – up through her fingers, into her teeth. They chattered with fear, tapping a steady rhythm that pounded through her head.

"You are so brave, my love," Kalii had often said.  
After sword practice he had often wiped blood from her face and cupped her chin in his hands, his gold rings cold on her hot skin.  
"So brave," he'd murmur, and kiss her forehead.

But she was not brave.  
Brave was having the choice not to do something and choosing to do it anyway. She was _desperate_ : she took up the charge when it became clear that no one else would, she did things she would rather not because she had no choice.  
At some point she had learned that she could still the terror by simply asking herself what the worst thing that could happen was and, inevitably, the answer was that she might die. And that usually calmed her because Relta had long since learned that death was one thing she did not fear.

And so she had earned the reputation as a warrior queen, a she-wolf, for no reason other than acting out of desperation and despair.  
She could've watched her husband march into battle and stayed behind the city walls with the other women, cutting her hair and rending her clothes while pleading for mercy to the gods. But she knew the man she had married had as much sense as a child on a horse, as much tactical skill as a pigeon. He was a good man, an inspiring leader and a dreadful warrior. She'd ridden to the battle with him with instructions from Yanis, the commander of the army, to stay behind the lines.  
And she'd remained there till she could take it no more, then broken rank and ridden in, pure red fear and fury blanking out everything. Her dogs rode at her heels, snarling and snapping till one of them was taken down by a spear. The men of the Phoenician guard had been so astonished at her appearance in their midst that she had stabbed two, slashing wildly about her, till Yanis pulled up at her side and pulled her reins, pulling her out of the melée.

That evening, bubbling with victory, the soldiers of Kalios had toasted their king and their new queen, the young one, the foreign one, the one he had finally taken after the death of his first wife. The foreign queen with her blue-veined skin, her clear blue eyes.  
The Kalions had treated her with their sullen, silent suspicion at first, but that battle had changed everything. She became one of them.  
Never mind that she had barely been on the battle field for an hour, never mind that she had probably not managed to deliver a fatal blow, she had ridden out into the midst of her men, to fight at her king's side. It was a thing of legends, a thing of lore!  
The king had toasted her, his huge arm around her shoulders, squeezing her with his raucous affection. He'd presented her with the pelt of a white wolf and draped it around her shoulders, despite her protests. The fur sat, heavy and hot, across her back, and it stank, as wolf fur is wont to do. The men cheered and drank to her and she tried to respond in kind, while King Kalii smiled deeply into the eyes of his lover, Cano.  
Cano had spent the entire battle in Kalii's tent, wringing his hands and burning incense: he had begged her to stay with him and join the incantations, but Relta had realised that she would rather take her chances on the battlefield. Anything was better than the cloying scent of those damned herbs, even the scent of blood and metal.

She'd raised her goblet and caught Yanis' eye across the banquet tables and caught his silent nod.  
She had gained his respect and he was one man she admired. He wouldn't tell the real story of her foray because he realised that the legend she had sparked served a fair greater purpose than the truth. She would become their mascot, their wolf-queen. The people of the tiny city-state would come to call her Leto, after Apollo's mother, who gave birth to him as a she-wolf, but Relta repressed a shudder when she heard it. Among this odd little folk in their mountain city, wolves were respected and revered; but in her country wolves moved between light and dark, they took human form and ate corpses on the battlefield. She did not want to be a wolf; she did not want to be a queen. She had wanted to walk out of Kalios with her daughter and cross the water to the western kingdoms of Greece where she could find a boat that would take them home.

Instead she was trapped somehow, finding herself married to a good man who loved her like she loved her dogs, with a kindly affection and benevolent interest, whose passion was solely directed at another man. He had only married her because he'd admired her mother, and her mother's magic, and he'd found her daughter ornamental. Relta was beautiful in an odd and freakish way: he could dress her in the royal robes of cobalt blue, brush out her copper hair and stroke her white skin. She was clever in conversation and educated to the point that was vulgar in a woman – but she couldn't help it, she had been exposed to too much learning. Kalii and Cano doted on her, spoiled Ana, and they'd become a strange little family as the years had passed.

Relta knew her place, she knew her role: Kalii didn't have to explain it to her twice.  
He would do her the honour of marrying her, as a favour to her mother for saving his lover's life, and in return she would be a good and dutiful queen that tended to the needs of the people, sat by his side at banquets, accepted her place in his household and his affair. She would have enough to eat, a roof over her head, and as much love as he could give her. Which would never be enough, she had quickly realised.  
Enough to keep her from walking into the waves, but never enough to stop her thinking about it.

"And children?" she'd asked hopefully.  
"You have one already," he'd answered, as though the idea was preposterous.  
"But... an heir?"  
"My brother has two sons," Kalii said gently. "Besides, I know not if the people would accept a son of our bloodline."  
And he'd smiled at her sweetly.

 _Our bloodline_ meant tainted by _her_ otherness, _her_ foreignness.  
Kalii's brother had married the daughter of a nobleman from the highland and had given him four healthy children. As far as her husband was concerned, the lineage had been preserved and he had no further duties to fulfil.  
Young at the time, her mother had bullied Relta into the union, telling her she had no choice, they were guests. She had to marry him or, by the gods, he could punish them. He could take her by force, keep her as a concubine, sell little Ana into slavery. Did she want that?  
Relta did not.  
She'd married the king, which was universally decried as a sign of his folly, and was left to forge a place for herself and her small daughter in the Kalion palace.

If she'd hoped for support from her mother, her hope had been misplaced: her mother walked out of the city gates one day and boarded a ship going west – or east, nobody knew any more – and she was gone with the warm winds that had driven them south in the first place. Her daughter remained in Kalios, a place that always seemed cold, even when the sun split its grey stones, and waited for the day when she, like her mother, would walk out the gate and down to the wooden jetty by the shore, to board a boat that would take her home.  
Except Relta wanted to walk away hand in hand with her daughter.

"The Achaeans are here," the priestess whispered. "Their boats fill the bay. The King of Ithaca is come and the black warriors, the Myrmidons."  
"The Myrmidons?"  
Relta had heard of them: the poets told stories of the battles of Achilles at court. Relta had assumed that most of them were just exaggeration – she had heard stories of her own battles, none of which bore even the faintest resemblance to the truth.  
"Is he as beautiful as they say, their Achilles?" she asked teasingly, trying to make the priestess smile to break the unbearable tension.

The older woman sighed.  
"He is golden, majesty. From the tip of his head to his feet. He walks like one of the gods among us, like something I have seen in my visions."  
Relta was startled. The priestess was not one for hyperbole.  
"Really?"  
"His armour is black and his eyes are black. He walks with the same disdain as a god among mortals."  
"His eyes are _black_? The poets say his eyes are as blue as mine," Relta said.  
The priestess finally smiled, but it was a mirthless smile: "There is a blackness in his eyes, majesty. If you ever see him, you will know what I mean."  
"I pray to the gods I won't," the queen replied.

The priestess stood slowly. "Will you be safe here, majesty?" she asked.  
"The king promised me sanctuary," she replied. "He will not tell them where I am."

She hoped it was true. Her brother-in-law had agreed to let her hide till Agamemnon's wrath was directed elsewhere, then she could disappear across the sea. He had agreed to send Ana on ahead, entrusting her to Cano's care. It was a neat solution to many problems, the tidying up of his brother's court, disposing of his lover and his step-daughter all at once. Who would notice a little dark-haired girl, travelling with a man that might be her father? No one.  
But who would not notice the White Queen of Kalios? That was a harder feat to achieve.  
"The Myrmidons sacked the temple of Apollo at Troy," the priestess said, her face drawn and ashen. "They killed the priests and defiled the virgins. If they come for you, they will do the same."  
"This is the temple of Aphrodite," Relta smiled. "There will be no bloodshed here."

The priestess withdrew, her face downcast. She believed that as much as Relta did.


	4. 4

"You honour us," Odysseus said smoothly.  
Achilles glanced up and him and looked quickly down before he started to laugh.  
Odysseus was as smooth as an eel: he'd met the king at the gates of the city and extend the hand of friendship in Agamemnon's name. With practised ease he had made polite conversation to the king on their walk through the city to the palace. Citizens lined the route, holding limp flowers in their hands, which they threw in the path of the soldiers. Achilles knew they had been persuaded – strong-armed – into their part in the reception: the women did not smile and the men glared at them with open antagonism. Trumpets blared to cover up the sound of silence: no one clapped, no one cheered. The city's discontent with their king and the invitation he had extended to invasion was palpable. The streets of Kalios were rocky and uneven and they wound in a serpentine fashion up towards the grey stone building that looked like a fortress but functioned as a palace.  
Not for the first time Achilles missed the lush, fertile plains of Phtia. Nowhere was less like his home than this stony little city with its stony-countenanced citizens.

The new King of Kalios, Nikephoras, was a copy of his older brother: a smaller, quieter copy, without any of his brother's excesses or exuberance. He was a dull, earnest man and he threw a dull, earnest banquet and presided over it with his dull, earnest wife.  
Achilles and Patroclus kept their eyes on the platters before them, small smirks around their mouths.  
The men were being fed in the lower halls and in the interludes between the musicians' strumming, Achilles could hear raucous laughter faintly echoing up the halls. He wished he were with them: instead, he was trapped between Patroclus and the Kalion queen, who would not meet his eye and drank her wine in tiny sips like a cat. Every time he extended a hand to pull some meat off the platter, she winced, as though she were afraid that he might accidentally brush against her.  
The meal was excruciating; not even the meat was good.

Odysseus was honing in for the kill.  
"... And no doubt you are keen to honour Agamemnon, the King of Kings. In return for your fealty, he has instructed me to offer you his friendship and loyalty. United under his special care, the kingdoms of Greece are all the stronger against our common enemies."  
"Indeed, indeed," the new king murmured.  
"I am sure you are keen to pay him tribute," Odysseus suggested, as though it were something the king could hardly wait to do.  
"Indeed," he said again, a little paler this time. "Indeed we are. Whatever might strengthen this alliance."  
"Strengthening the alliance – his very words!" Odysseus said, raising his cup. Seated to the right of Patroclus, he gave the younger man a nudge and he also raised his goblet. Achilles sighed silently and raised his, too. A fraction.  
"Agamemnon felt it necessary to suggest ... " Odysseus chose his words carefully, "... an exercise to demonstrate the trust the kingdom of Kalios would place in him. He thought you might like to place one of your children in his care. As a sign of the love and faith you place in him as the ... father of Greece."

Besides Achilles, the queen gasped, then smothered a sob. The king swallowed; Achilles watched his throat bob, then settle.  
He licked his lips and replied, "I am sure the King of Kings understands how necessary it is – at this time of unrest – that I have my sons by my side – "  
The queen made a tiny sound.  
"Perhaps one of your daughters?" Odysseus suggested.  
The girls, no more than 15 or 16, were round-face girls with a sallow complexion. They sat like two chickens on a perch, heads low, chins jutting out, gripping each other's hands when they heard Osysseus' words.  
Achilles felt another wave of laughter rising: he could just imagine Agamemnon's face when he was presented with one of these dumpy children as a form of tribute. The thought was delightful.  
"She would be treated with all honour due to their rank and live in the best accommodation we can offer," Odysseus said smoothly, his smile reassuring.  
"In a tent on the beach of Troy?" the queen burst out, unable to remain silent any longer. "I will not have it – I will not – "  
"Damaris!" her husband snapped and she was silent again. Nikephoras cleared his throat and shot Odysseus a tight smile.  
"Perhaps something we can discuss a little later?" he said. "In closer company."  
"Of course," Odysseus had said smiling and inclining of head. "Certainly, your majesty."

Odysseus and the king withdrew to discuss coin and salt and other tributes Agamemnon had demanded.  
Achilles and Patroclus huddled together and drank their wine; they did not make an effort to speak to their Kalion hosts, who, for the most party, were happy to turn their backs on them and whisper of their own affairs.  
When Odysseus returned, he gave them a quick nod, a sly smile, and Achilles knew he had bargained the poor new king into a tight corner. They drank another toast to good health, then one to success in battle, and finally Odysseus begged their leave. The ships would be loaded at dawn and the Achaeans would return to Troy, leaving the King of Kalios to settle into his new role.

xXx

Queen Damaris grabbed them when the ascended the stairs. The servant leading them to their rooms took the lamp and she sent him away.  
She walked them down the dark corridors herself: the lamps were dim, trimmed low, and the night was cloudy.  
"What if I give you Relta?" she asked Odysseus. She continued to ignore Achilles, not even looking in his direction. "My sister-in-law," she added, when they looked at each other in confusion.  
"I thought she was dead," Achilles said.  
The Queen shook her head but she continued to stare at Odysseus. "She's alive. She sought refuge in the temple of Aphrodite. She wanted to be protected by Aries but they turned her away, so the high priestess took her in. My husband took pity on her and let her hide because he knew Agamemnon would want her handed over."  
"Agamemnon thinks she's dead," Odysseus said thoughtfully. "That's what your emissaries said – or implied, more like."  
The Queen shook her head urgently. "Oh, she's alive. Take her instead," she said, "and leave my children here."

Odysseus and Achilles exchanged glances. Patroclus looked from one to the other, his face eager, but he said nothing.  
"Very well," said Odysseus finally. "We will take her. As tribute."  
The Queen clutched the lamp so firmly that the flame flickered and nearly went out.  
"But quietly," she said. "Or there will be a riot. No bloodshed – "  
She glanced at Achilles for the first time, her lip twisted in distaste. "You cannot slaughter the servants of Aphrodite."  
He shrugged carelessly, looking down at the drab little woman who looked out of place in her fine robes.  
She narrowed her eyes at him and said, "Do it at dawn. Have her on your ship and out of this city before the winds turn."  
With that, she pushed open a door to show them their sleeping quarters, then spun on her heel and hurried off down the silent corridor.

xXx

"Then you go in and get her," Achilles said. He picked an apple off the top of the pile in the basket and examined it for bruises.

They were standing outside the temple; the morning sky was just starting to light up with smudges of pink. The men, groggy-eyed and bad-tempered, were loading the ships but Achilles had pulled some of his most trusted soldiers aside to get the old queen out of her hiding place. He had suggested they just march in, turn the place upside-down and drag the witch out, but Patroclus had reminded him of their promise to do it quietly. Discreetly.

"I will go in and get her!" his young cousin said hotly. "I'm certain that I'm a match for one small woman!"  
"Even one with magic powers?" Achilles said, biting into his apple.  
It was probably meant as part of a tribute to Aphrodite: apples were, after all, the symbol of love. But Achilles was hungry and the apple was black-red and sweet. He licked the juice from his lips and bit again.  
Patroclus snorted. "You said yourself that it was nonsense."  
"Fine," Achilles shrugged. "Go in and get her. You're half in love with her anyway. Go in and persuade her with all your charm to come back to Troy with us. If that doesn't work, put a sword to her throat and that should."  
Patroclus rolled his eyes and went up the steps, his sword drawn.

"My Lord," one of the men, Timon, said. "Is this wise?"  
"The worst she can do is throw a pot of shit on him," Achilles said breezily. "That seems to be her weapon of choice."  
He picked up another apple and turned it over in his hand.  
"Eat," he said, pushing the basket with the toe of his boot.  
"Are these not offerings to the goddess?" Timon asked nervously. "Do you think we should eat them?"  
The men eyed the fruit warily and no one stepped forward to take any. Achilles sighed audibly and kicked the basket so that the apples spilled, rolling down the steps.  
"Eat," he commanded and the men scrambled to pick them up. He turned his attention back to the entrance of the temple.  
Where was Patroclus?

The minutes passed; the sky slowly grew pinker. Achilles began to feel a sense of unease. What could have happened? He would have surely heard something if his cousin had been attacked? Maybe he was lost in amongst the offices, the altar. Disoriented in the dark.  
"Timon," he said, "Go and see what has happened to the boy."  
Timon pulled his sword and ran up the steps, disappearing into the darkness of the entrance.  
There was silence, except for the sound of a cock crowing as the first sliver of sunlight rose behind the mountain.  
Achilles could stand it no longer.  
"Follow me," he said and took his sword in hand. The men padded silently behind him, dropping their apple cores on the stone steps.

He heard her voice first, soft and teasing in the darkness. She laughed and so did Patroclus. Achilles blinked, trying to see in the gloom.  
"Patroclus," he called but there was silence. "Patroclus!"  
Then he saw them at the other end of the long room. They noticed him at the same time: looking up, startled, like he'd caught them stealing something: a piece of bread, a coin, a kiss. Patroclus was sitting on a low step, sitting next to a woman in a white fur, Timon standing over them, his sword dangling casually from his hand. Her knees were almost touching his cousin's, there was an impression of intimacy, even though her hands were folded primly in her lap and her head downcast. Achilles felt a surge of annoyance. He gave his men a sharp gesture and they approached the steps.

"Cousin!" Patroclus called as he strode over, anger bubbling up inside, "This is the Queen of Kalios!"  
"No longer," she muttered with a rueful laugh.  
"You had an order," Achilles said.  
Patroclus stood up, reluctantly. The queen remained seated.  
She was, indeed, very pale but her skin was white, not blue. Her face tapered to a narrow chin and she had a quick, assessing gaze. When she smiled – and she looked like someone who smiled often – two dimples appeared in her cheeks.  
She looked up at Achilles, mustering him from head to foot with a frankness he found almost brazen. Then she ducked her head in a gesture of deference that felt mocking in its submission. Achilles realised he didn't remember her name and didn't know how to address her.

"My lady," he said stiffly. "We have come to take you back to Troy. Immediately."  
She stood up, a languorous movement that caused her robe to make a slithering sound like a snake over the stone.  
"As your captive or your guest?" she asked him, looking up.  
"That's up to you," Achilles replied coldly.  
"Hmmm," the old queen said. She pretended to think about it, her eyes wandering off to the side.  
"Does it require consideration?" he snapped.  
"In truth, there are advantages and disadvantages to both," she said pensively. "Give me a moment."  
"Excuse me?"  
"Well, if I were your captive, no one would fault me for trying to kill you," she answered. "But if I were your guest... Well, that would just be plain rude, wouldn't it?"

One of the men behind him snickered and covered it up with a cough.  
Achilles stared at her.  
"Oh, very well, then," she said. "I am willing to be the recipient of your generous hospitality. Thank you for the offer, my lord prince."  
She beamed at him and he was momentarily thrown off balance.  
"Gather your things," he said haughtily, trying to restore the equilibrium. She reached behind her and took up a leather pouch. Had she been waiting for them?

"Let me carry that," Patroclus said eagerly, taking it off her.  
"Cousin," Achille said sharply and jerked his head at the queen.  
"It's not heavy," she reassured him. "I can carry it."  
And as he watched, the queen smiled into his cousin's eyes and placed a finger on his hand, a feather-brush, a breath. Patroclus' smile became wider and he handed the pouch back, with the look of a man that had just been stunned by a blow to the head.  
"Come," Achilles snapped, aware that the men behind him were silent. She moved through them, smiling at each one.  
"Hello, good morning," she said. "Good morning, good morning! Aphrodite will surely be pleased to see so many handsome men in her temple so early in the morning."  
She laughed, the sound bouncing off the temple walls and some of the men joined in.

Achilles grabbed her arm and hissed in her ear.  
"Are you trying to bewitch my men?" he hissed. "Like you did my cousin? What were you talking to him about?"  
She looked at his fingers, gripping her arm, and raised an eyebrow.  
"Phtia," she said.  
"Phtia?"  
"Where you come from, I think?"  
"Why were you talking about Phtia?" Achilles demanded.  
"Why not?" she said sincerely. "It sounds wonderful. I hope I get to visit it some day."

And she smiled at him again, her beatific smile, wriggling out from beneath his grip.  
"We are going to the docks, I take it?" she asked. "Then we should go by the back road. The stairs cut into the cliff are steep but they lead directly to the beach."  
He watched her as she walked through the group of men, pulling her cloak about her.  
"Are you not afraid?" Achilles said, as she descended the steps of the temple.  
"Should I be?" she called back over her shoulder.  
The men followed her docilely, walking behind her as she led the way.  
He watched her white hood bob between the men's black shields and hurried to catch up. 

Something had just happened and he wasn't entirely sure what it was.


	5. 5

As a child, her mother impressed upon her how much people love to talk about themselves.  
"Especially men. Look at them, look them deep in the eyes, and listen to every word they have to say, as though they were the last words you would ever hear."  
Relta would nod, her eyes fixed on her mother's face.  
"Learn names," her mother said. "Learn names quickly. Ask questions, remember the answers. People find it hard to kill you when you have created a connection with them. Become their friend."  
Her mother would smile at her, one of her darting smiles, to show that she might be joking.  
Or maybe not.

"Men are stupid," she said. "Women are smart. We've been cursed with smaller bodies, smaller bones, so we have to use the wits the gods have given us to protect ourselves, do you understand?"  
And Relta nodded again, fervently.  
"There is one thing you must learn and that is to get the measure of the man. Quickly, quickly. Everybody needs something: if you give them what they need, you will make them feel like you are the only person who has ever really understood them. And then, my love, they are yours."  
She snapped her fingers, as though it were a magic trick. Though Relta later learned that it was a magic trick, of sorts.  
"I understand, Mama. I will watch and I will learn, I promise."  
Her mother patted her on the back.  
"Good girl," she would say. "Cailín maith."

xXx

She was prepared for their coming.  
She knew she had been given sanctuary - but from whom? From men who were known to desecrate temples and murder priests.  
She knew they would come for her from the moment their sails were spotted on the horizon. She had lived with the sick dread as their ships drew closer and docked, she had bitten on her fingers to stop her teeth chattering when she heard the trumpets announce their procession through the streets. She had spent the night at the door of the temple, watching the flickering lights of the castle, wondering when they would come for her.  
In the darkest depths of night she had crawled to her mat to sleep, by which time she was praying that they would just come and get her, so that the waiting - the awful waiting - would be over.

When one of the temple servants woke her to report that a group of men had silently gathered in front of the temple – Achaeans, armed, dressed in black – she almost felt a sense of relief.  
She dressed quickly while the acolytes that had risen early ran to wake the older ones, and they all gathered quickly in front of the altar.  
"They've come for me," Relta said, the words catching in her throat. She had to swallow twice to speak again. "I will meet them. You should all hide."  
She clutched her leather pouch, the one that contained her embroidered chiton, some gold, her runes and the map her father had drawn.  
"Majesty," the old priestess implored her, "if you leave now – "  
"They will kill you all," Relta said bluntly. "They sacked the temple of Apollo; they killed the priests and toppled the statues. You really need to hide."

She felt a wave of sick rise, her teeth began to chatter again, but she smiled at the anxious faces.  
"I was planning to go to Ithaca anyway," she said, trying to lighten the mood. "So perhaps the gods are simply sending me the Ithacan king to ensure me safe passage."  
The faces in the little group around her looked uneasy, but some nodded and the old priestess squeezed her hand. Then they heard the sound of someone pushing open the heavy door and they all scattered, leaving her alone in the large hall.  
Relta drew a deep breath and then stood, her hands folded, and waited.

When he entered, blinking in the dim light, she nearly laughed out loud. A boy! He was just a boy!  
Well, a youth. He was fair-haired and long-limbed, and he wore the black armour that designated him a Myrmidon.  
She watched him, head tipped to one side, as he turned slowly, his sword drawn and his mouth slightly open as he looked at the friezes on the wall. Instinctively she knew him, she understood him and she felt hysterical laughter mount inside. She had been reckoning with a pack of killers and instead they sent in a smooth-faced boy, like a lamb to slaughter. On some level, on some instinctive and irrational level, she felt mildly insulted.  
Is this the best they could send? she thought. A little sheep into fetch a she-wolf?

"My lord?" she said in a quivery voice.  
The boy looked around, startled, drew himself up to his full height.  
"Are you the Queen of Kalios?" he said, deepening his voice.  
"No, my lord," she answered meekly. "I am the former Queen of Kalios."

She bowed her head till he approached, then peeked up at him shyly from beneath her eyelashes.  
"Are you the great warrior Achilles?" she asked, biting her lip in pretend fear.  
The youth preened.  
That was it: he actually preened, straightening his chest and gripping his sword tighter.  
"I am not," he said solemnly, "I am his cousin, Patroclus."  
After that, it was as easy as plucking an apple from a tree.

"Are you really a Myrmidon?" she asked breathlessly and the poor child almost fell over himself to show her his armour.  
When the second man came in, Patroclus was in the middle of telling her a joke about his homeland – what was the difference between a Spartan, a Mycenaean and a Phtian? - and the second man, Timon, stood to the side, not quite knowing what to do. She'd drawn him in, asked his name, admired his sword – the blade was marked, was that an accident or on purpose? Timon had shown her the marks he'd made to commemorate the great battles he'd been in and he teased Patroclus about his sword, which was too shiny, too new.

Out of the corner of her eye, she watched the blond man enter with the rest of the warriors but she pretended not to notice him, watched him approach.  
He was different than the others. This was the one they called Achilles, the one whose mother was said to be a goddess or demi-goddess or some such nonsense – Relta had never quite understood the Achaeans' odd gods and goddesses. She had paid lip-service to their deities, knowing all the while that the true gods resided in the north among her people. The capricious gods of the south spent too much time provoking each other and impregnating humans instead of ruling the cosmos with dignity.  
She watched the god's son approach, his lip curled in distrust and distaste.  
Like the priestess had said, he was golden, from his flaxen hair on the top of his head to the burnished skin of his muscular body, and he walked with the arrogance of a man who had been raised on flattery, his surety of his own superiority evident in his every step. Instinctively, he irritated her, but she swallowed her feelings, redirecting her gaze to Patroclus' eager face. The boy had reached the punch line of his joke, so she threw her head back and laughed, allowing her fingers to graze his knee for a second as she pretended to adjust her robe.

Inwardly she braced herself for the golden one, her head bowed in mock-submission.  
"If you are not sure," her mother had said, "unbalance the man until you get a sense of who he is. Be not what he expects and watch how he reacts."

That was easy to do. Achilles was clearly a man who expected women to simper and smile, and Relta didn't feel like simpering and smiling at him. She had made her peace with the fact that she would be taken to Troy; she wasn't stupid: she'd seen the look on the fat little king's face and knew he would have his revenge. All she had to do was make sure she didn't end up prostrate in front of him – she would have to think of a way to manoeuvre him on to her side. She assessed the blond one in front of her: was he Agamemnon's friend and ally? Or was he his foe? Either way, she was certain she could use him to her own end, she just needed to figure him out.  
At that moment he was looking at her with the same frank appraisal she had given him, taking in her coppery hair and her white skin. The Achaeans found her paleness fascinating; they liked to rub the freckles on her arms with their fingers, touching her soft, fine hair. She tried to see if the man was attracted to her, but he just glowered at her and narrowed his eyes when she made his men laugh.

With more courage than she felt, she walked lightly between his men, looking them in the eyes, trying to take note of their faces. A few of them drew back as she passed, instinctively bowing their heads and she glided past, her wolf-fur around her shoulders. She inclined her head in return: she was, after all, a queen. At least, she had been a queen. Either way, the Greeks might be less inclined to sell her into slavery if she was royalty – or would that simply make her more valuable?  
Her heart stopped with fear.

At that moment, the blond one - the golden one - grabbed her arm and hissed in her ear,  
"Are you trying to bewitch my men? Like you did my cousin? What were you talking to him about?"  
"Phtia," she answered, mock-innocently.  
She felt his breath on her face, smelled the leather of his armour, the dull smell of dried blood.  
She allowed herself to look up into his eyes, raising an eyebrow as though she were not terrified, shaking to her core.  
"It's where you are from, I think?" she asked lightly.  
He made no sign of letting her go, so she twisted her arm out from his grip and moved away. She finished the exchange by smiling at his men, at Patroclus and Timon, as though they had just been caught in casual conversation.  
"We are going to the docks, I take it?" she asked. "Then we should go by the back road. The stairs cut into the cliff are steep but they lead directly to the beach."  
She beamed at Patroclus and he fell into line behind her.

Yes, she had made her peace with it.  
She was going to be taken to Troy and from there she would make her way to the western coast – to Ithaca, preferably, but she was sure she could make her way from Mycennae to the coast. Just her luck to be lumbered with a bunch of warriors from Phtia, but she might be able to persuade Agamemnon to send her back to the mainland or let her go – or she would just talk and walk her way off the beaches of Troy and onto a ship, any ship, heading west. She would keep going till she got to Carthage and from there, she would board a ship with Ana and go back home. She would think of something.

"Are you not afraid?" Achilles called.  
Her stomach lurched again, her knees knocked. She was petrified. Could the stupid man not see that?  
What's the worst thing that could happen? she thought. I could die. Am I afraid of dying? No.  
"Should I be?" she called back over her shoulder.  
She pulled her cloak about her, brushing her face against the soft fur of the wolf for comfort. When she looked around, the soldiers were waiting tamely behind her, Achilles standing off to one side with a deep frown furrowing his forehead, staring at her with a funny look on his face. She pulled her gaze away; he made her uneasy and she did not trust him.  
"Shall we go?" she asked Timon, who nodded.  
She set off down the steps, a small white figure surrounded by men in black armour.


	6. 6

"What's wrong with you, friend?" Odysseus asked.

Achilles stood by his ship, his eyes darting left and right, one foot tapping impatiently.  
"Where is the damned woman?" he said, agitated.  
He had sent Eurdorus to fetch her but he still hadn't returned. It felt somehow familiar, like a play he'd seen once too often. What was that witch up to now?

Odysseus laid a hand on his arm.  
"Calm down, brother," he laughed. "I'm not in that much of a rush to meet her. Besides, Patroclus is guarding her – what do you think has happened?"

That was just it. Achilles couldn't put his unease into words without sounding foolish.  
What could he say?  
She unnerved him. When she thought he wasn't looking, her blue eyes settled on him, studying him. She was beautiful, but in a way that suggested an undertow of unpredictability. He felt she didn't fear him so he found her submissiveness false, as though she were laughing at him beneath her veil.

And Achilles certainly didn't want her talking to his men; they were already showing her too much deference and since she had arrived on the docks, the mood of the men loading the ships had changed. She'd surveyed their work, beaming her wide smile, shooting those shy little glances out from under her eyelashes. Even as Achilles watched, his men returned her grin and started to load the ship a bit more quickly, heaving the boxes and crates given to them by the new king as tribute with more energy – and muscle flexing – than they really warranted.

Finally he had sent her off to sit down on a low wall out of the way and Patroclus had rushed to guard her.  
"Tie her up," Achilles had ordered, but his cousin had hesitated.  
"Tie her _up_ ," he growled and the young man nodded.  
But he knew that, if he checked, the young queen would be sitting without as much as an inch of rope around her, with Patroclus like a pup at her feet.  
He thought it better to stay away, rather than to deal with his young cousin's disobedience.

"There she is!" Odysseus said and nodded.  
The throng of men parted to let her pass and she picked her way past the goods piled on the dockside. Behind, Eudorus and Patroclus flanked her like manservants.  
"Thank you, Echepolus," she said as one of the men pulled a rope out from underfoot.  
"How does she know their names?" Achilles said, annoyed.  
Echepolus' eyes lingered on the White Queen's back till he caught Achilles' stare and then he busied himself with the rope.

"My lords," she said when she stopped in front of them.  
Her eyes were modestly downcast.  
"The former queen of Kalios; Odysseus, king of Ithaca," Achilles said.  
He realised he still couldn't remember her name – ironic, considering she probably knew the name of every man who touched an oar on his ship.  
"Highness," said Odysseus with a smile. "How wonderful to meet again."

She glanced up at him and a flicker of recognition crossed her face. The witch laughed out loud, a hand clasped over her heart in mirth.  
"We have met before!" she declared. "I apologise, my lord. I hope you will forgive me. I was doing what my husband would have expected."  
"A pity his brother thinks differently," Odysseus said in his dry way.  
The woman looked at him and Achilles saw her eyes narrow a fraction, assessing him.  
Then she shrugged.  
"My mistake," she said softly."My error of judgement."

"King Agamemnon will be most interested to make your acquaintance again," Odysseus remarked.  
The Kalion queen kept her eyes down, nodded slowly.  
"I expect so," she said in the same soft voice.  
"She sails with you?" Odysseus asked casually.  
_No!_ Achilles thought, but he pretended to consider it.

"You led the expedition, perhaps it is better if she sails with you," he said in a thoughtful voice.  
Behind him, Patroclus made a tiny sound of disappointment, bit it back.  
Achilles rolled his eyes. The last thing he wanted was that woman on his ship, staring at him with her wolf-eyes. Let Odysseus have her, and good riddance.  
But as soon as he had spoken his words, he noticed her reaction – a quick jolt, a lightning crackle. A tiny smile crossed her lips, then she chewed her bottom lip with her teeth, trying to keep something in.

Odysseus was looking out to sea, gauging the wind, and he didn't notice.  
"Aye, fine by me," he said. "Winds are on our side, so I expect we'll – "  
"No, I've changed my mind," Achilles said haughtily. "We'll take her. We pulled her out of that temple, might as well make sure she gets safely back to Troy."

The queen glanced at him anxiously.  
"I will surely be safe with the King of Ithaca," she said and directed the full intensity of her smile at Achilles' friend.  
Odysseus was momentarily taken aback.  
"Well, I – " he stammered.  
Achilles fumed. He didn't recognise exactly what she wanted, but he knew it was something that Odysseus had or could offer.  
And he had known the man far too long to let him fall prey to a cunning little she-wolf.

"No, she sails with us. Eudorus, take her on board. Patroclus, make yourself useful and help load those barrels."  
The disappointment on the queen's face could not be hidden but she followed Eudorus meekly, her exuberance temporarily extinguished.

"What will become of her in Troy?" Patroclus asked anxiously when they were out of earshot. "What will Agamemnon do to her?"  
"What will he not do to her?" Achilles answered casually. "He'll do what he wants to her, is my guess."  
"That man's a pig!" he cried, "You can't just _give_ her to him."

Odysseus patted his shoulder.  
"He might be merciful," he said, "if she shows enough contrition. Perhaps you can tell her about Agamemnon, give her some ideas about how to behave."  
" _Cousin_ ," Patroclus said imploringly.  
"He'll probably bed her and sell her into slavery," Achilles said. "She'll fetch a good price with that red hair."

Patroclus looked from one man to the other.  
"We must save the queen," he said. "We can't let Agamemnon just have her."  
Achilles shook his head.  
"She's not my problem," he said.  
"Indeed," Odysseus said. "Indeed she's not. Agamemnon is looking forward to having her, that much is certain."

He nodded thoughtfully.  
"Of all the gold and jewels we've loaded, she's the one thing he wants the most. She is worth her weight in salt to him, let me tell you that. He would be livid if anything happened to her."  
He straightened up, pulled on his breastplate.  
"Aye, well," he said in the same thoughtful tone. "Looks just about ready to me, everything seems to be on board. I'll bid you farewell for now and hope we make good time on the waves."

He sauntered off across the dock, giving his men the signal to board the ship. The last Ithacan lingerers on the docks took their leave of their Myrmidon companions and quickly ran on board.  
Achilles raised his arm to Eudorus to give him the signal to ready for their departure.  
Patroclus turned to him once more and Achilles smiled at him kindly. A germ of an idea had been planted in his mind.

"Fine," Achilles said. "Fine. Very well. We'll treat her like the queen she is and show her every comfort."  
"And when we get to Troy?" Patroclus asked anxiously.  
Achilles laughed his husky laugh.  
"Cousin, I'm sure that by the time we get to Troy, Agamemnon will no longer relish her as much as he expects."  
"What do you plan to do?"

Achilles smiled at him.  
"I will simply be a most charming and gracious host," he said solemnly.  
Patroclus opened his mouth but his cousin cut him off.  
"The men are waiting for us," Achilles said. "And your queen as well, I wager. Let's go."

He watched his young cousin hurry on board and he could hardly keep himself from smiling. He would seduce that odd little woman and bed her before they got to Troy. When Agamemnon found that he was getting spoiled goods - Achilles' seconds - he would _spit_ with rage. All the better if the woman was infatuated with him, but once he slept with her, that might very well be the case.

The thought made him laugh out loud as he stepped on to the deck of the ship, causing the men to look up.  
"It's nothing," he said, "Give the order to the oarsmen, we can leave now."  
The men bustled to their positions, but he felt someone staring at him.  
When he turned he saw the White Queen standing at the other end of the ship, staring at him with her quizzical expression, but she ducked her head when he looked her way and pretended to look out to sea.


	7. 7

She kept herself busy and tried not to vomit as she got used to the rolling motion of the boat.  
Some of the men noticed her green complexion and teased her; Relta responded with laughter that rang hollow to her ears – not that they seemed to notice. She tried to sooth the sickness by closing her eyes: she shut them against the bright sunshine and tried to concentrate on remembering her daughter's face.  
_With every pull of the oars,_ she thought, _I'm getting a bit closer to her, wherever she may be._  
All Relta knew is that her daughter and Cano had boarded a boat bound for Crete, and from there they would surely go onward to Sicily or Malta. One year from now, they were to meet in Carthage: she had one year to get to away from these Achaeans and their stupid wars, to get across the waters to the city of Carthago, and then she would be free.

She was trying to conjure up the image of the map in her pouch, trying to imagine her route, but was interrupted by a tap on her shoulder.  
When she looked around, Eudorus was standing beside her with a goblet in his hand.  
"My lady," he said. "For your seasickness. You should drink it, but slowly, mind. Also, eat this – in small bites."  
He handed her a piece of cloth with a small chunk of bread in it.  
"It'll settle your stomach," he said and smiled at her.  
He had the most extraordinary blue eyes: so light, they were almost white against his tanned face.

"Thank you, Eudorus," she said gently. "You're very kind."  
"They're from Achilles," he replied. "Oh, and my lord said you should not shut your eyes. Keep them fixed on the horizon till the sickness subsides."

Relta glanced down the gangway to the bow, where Achilles stood with his back to her, talking to one of the men, the navigator. He gave no indication that he even recognised her presence on his ship.  
"Thank him from me," she said. "He's a very ... attentive host."

Eudorus bowed and made his way back between the men, bending down to slap one of them on the shoulder in jest as he passed.  
She drank the liquid: it was some kind of fortified wine, with honey and herbs, trying not to let her mouth twist in distaste.  
Her stomach immediately lurched and tried to get rid of it, but she kept it down, afraid she would spray the foul-smelling mixture all over the deck and be laughed at for it. Instead, she nibbled the bread and looked at the horizon: north, northwest, where she wanted to be, wishing the boat were taking another course.

"Are you feeling better?" Achilles asked.  
She looked up, shielding her eyes from the sun. Backlit by light, he looked like had been sent down from Olympus and the thought made her smile.  
"Yes," she said, and added a "Thank you" as an afterthought.  
He regarded her for a moment.  
"Come with me," he said in his imperious way and held out a hand.

She took his fingers gingerly: his fingers were warm, the skin rough. He led her to a trap door and threw it open.  
He scrambled down, then waved that she should follow.  
"Save me, Danu," she prayed, hitching her robe up a little and carefully descending down the ladder. The boat surged and she grabbed the sides with a gasp.  
"Careful," Achilles said and placed one of his large hands on each of her hips, steadying her.  
Relta felt the urge to shake wildly, shake him off, but the boat dipped and rose and she decided his firm grip was better than being flung off the ladder and onto the crates and barrels below.

She climbed down quickly, escaping his fingers with a little wriggle. He stood back, hands by his side, with a neutral expression on his face.  
"You must be tired," he said.  
He pulled back a curtain made of stained leather and revealed a bed, not much more than a narrow bunk. It was covered with a piece of brightly-coloured material and when her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she recognised it. Relta fought the urge to laugh hysterically, but a small giggle escaped.

"What's wrong?" Achilles said, frowning. "It's not much but it's – "  
"No, no, it's fine," she insisted. "It's just that the cloth – well, it's mine. It's from my bedchamber. In fact, I embroidered it."  
She picked up a corner to show him the small flowers she'd sewn with her handmaidens.  
"It was in this chest," he said. "I thought you would want a better cover than the one I use. I didn't realise it was yours."

He tapped the chest at his side and she sank to her knees, opening the lid. Inside were her robes, the curtains and bed coverings from her room. All yanked out of boxes and off walls, hastily thrown into a chest for Agamemnon's whores.  
She laughed out loud, a kind of mad desperation.  
"So I have been given a trousseau, by Zeus!" she said, wiping away tears of mirth.  
She had to laugh; she was dangerously close to crying when she fingered all of the cloth she had embroidered while her husband lay next to her in the rose garden, strumming his lute and laughing at Ana with her puppies.

"You can have what you want," Achilles said stiffly. "Take it, it's yours."  
"I don't want anything, thank you," she answered. "I won't need it."  
She could've bitten the words back as soon as she had said them.  
"Why won't you need them?" he asked, quick as a flash.  
_Because I'm going to run away?_ she thought. _Because I won't be able to carry them when I slip away one night, off into the darkness with my map and my runestones and my gold?_  
"Because they are too fine, my lord," she answered and bowed her head.

But she knew from his silence that he did not believe her.  
"May I ... may I sleep?" she asked, changing the subject.  
"That's why I brought you here," he said. "You look exhausted. When was the last time you slept? Slept properly?"  
Relta tried to think.  
Days. Several days. A week? More than a week? Since her husband died – months?

"I don't know," she confessed. "I honestly don't know."  
"Sleep," he said.  
He placed a hand on her shoulder. "You will be safe here."  
"I won't be... " she paused, "disturbed?"

Above them, they heard the boat creaking, the men shouting, the heaving of the oars. The ship moaned and huffed like a living thing.  
"You have my word," he said, looking at her with his blue eyes serious. "You can sleep here in peace."  
And strangely, she believed him. There was something about his earnest face that made her believe that she would be able to lie on that narrow bunk without fear of anyone creeping up on her while she rested.  
"Thank you," she said again.

He gave her one of his imperious nods and slipped away behind the curtain.  
Relta pulled back the cover and crawled into the bed. It smelled of him, that faint smell of his sweat, his hair, the leather of his armour. He had a soft linen cloth over a rolled-up fur as a pillow, which she shook to rearrange to her liking, then pulled up the cover she had made in the palace. It had been made for her bed in winter so it was far too warm in the clammy boat, but its weight was comforting.

She closed her eyes, convinced she would never be able to rest, much less sleep, but when she opened them again it was nearly dark.

xXx

Relta peeped out from the behind the curtain and peered up through the open trapdoor.  
It was dusk; the sky was indigo, still lit by the sunset. Men were walking back and forth, calling to each other overhead but the rowing had ceased.  
She heard Achilles' voice shouting some indistinct order and she froze at the sound, then scurried back behind the curtain.

She debated going back up on deck, but she realised that she still felt terribly tired. More than tired: weary. The weariness was seeping through her bones, all the way down to her toes, making her limbs heavy and her eyes droop. The sight of the bed was extremely tempting and even though she guessed she must have slept the entire day, she crawled back into its warmth and shut her eyes. The narrow bunk felt like the safest place in the world at that moment: the Greek had said she would be allowed to sleep in peace.  
Well, then, she intended to sleep.

What woke her next she did not know.  
Was it the sound, the creak of the bunk?  
The hardness of the body pressed against her, the smell of his skin, the warmth of his breath on her neck? She woke with a start and froze rigid.

"What are you _doing_?" she whispered.  
He was lying with his stomach to her back, his face pressed into her hair.  
"Trying to sleep," he said lazily and draped a large arm around her waist.

She pulled away, moving as close to the wall of the boat as she could. She shoved her face against the wood, trying to put a little space between their bodies. He just yawned and moved closer, bridging the gap again.  
"My _lord_ ," she hissed. S  
he felt him hardening and didn't know what to do – try to wriggle away and inadvertently send some kind of message, or remain utterly still in the hope that ... in the hope that... what? That he might think she was, maybe, dead? Asleep? Mummified?

"I'm tired," he said. "You have nothing to fear from me, girl."  
She spluttered in indignation.  
"What?" he said lazily. "If I wanted to take you against your will, your legs would already be spread. I have no interest in forcing myself on women."  
"That's reassuring," she said icily, to the wood of the boat in front of her nose. "Women of the world thank you for your consideration."  
"I prefer to wait till they moan for me," he said and she could hear the grin in his voice.  
Behind her, he stretched, raising the arm from her waist and putting it above above his head; with every move, she felt his hard muscles brush against her, felt ... that other thing push against her legs.

 _The bastard son of Hades_ , she thought angrily and wriggled around to face him.  
Achilles was lying on his side, his chin propped up under his hand.  
Their faces were mere inches from each other and she pulled as far away from him as she could. Even though no skin touched, she could still feel his heat, as though she were sitting next to a fire.

"You think _I'll_ moan for _you_?" she asked scornfully.  
She was so close that she could see the his face in the darkness, his full lips spread in a broad grin.  
_By the gods,_ she thought, _never before have I seen a face that I have wanted to slap so much._  
"I think so," he said calmly.  
"But we both know that eventually you're going to take me anyway, aren't you?" she said bitterly. "Whether I want it or not."  
"I told you," he said with exaggerated patience, "I have no interest in forcing myself on a woman. When you want it – when you _really_ want it ..."  
He trailed off and lowered her head, planting a feather-light kiss on her exposed collar bone, making her stomach lurch.  
His lips burned her skin and she drew back, horrified, clasping a hand over the place he had just touched.

Achilles just laughed his low, husky laugh.  
"I think I'll get up," she said crossly. "I don't feel like sleeping any more."  
He shrugged.  
"As you wish, my queen," he said, lying back on the bunk.

He made no effort to move or get up to let her out of bed, just closed his eyes with the appearance of one settling to sleep. Inwardly, she huffed in anger.  
" _Fine_ ," she muttered and crawled over him.  
Poised over his body, mid-scramble, she decided to change tack.  
She moved her back a little and let her chiton slide down over one white shoulder.  
"Oops, sorry," she whispered and brushed her hips against his.  
His eyes shot open.  
"I'm so sorry," she said again, allowing her breasts to graze his chest. "Do you think you could move over a bit to let me out?"

The tip of his tongue wet his upper lip.  
Wordlessly, he moved over to the inside of the bed. She turned, brushing her backside against his groin as she pretended to climb awkwardly out of the bed.  
"Beg your pardon, my lord," Relta said, head down, in a saccharine. "I hope I did not wake you."  
There was no reply, but she knew he was staring at her.  
"You _will_ moan for me," he replied from the darkness.  
" _Urrrgh_ ," she heaved, like someone about to vomit. "That kind of moan, perhaps."  
"Witch," Achilles laughed softly.  
"Cur," she replied and she could barely stop herself from grinning.


	8. 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Not safe for work.  
> Here be dragons.

Relta had no idea what time it was – an hour before dawn, perhaps?

She looked east and saw the faintest smudge of indigo in the darkness and wondered that it had barely been a day since the Mymidons had gathered in front of the temple to take her away.  
She picked her way carefully across the deck, pausing as she stepped between sleeping bodies, making sure she had safe footing before she moved on.

She was just at the bow of the ship when a soft voice called, "Are you all right, my lady?"  
Startled, she looked around and saw a hand, waving in the darkness.  
When she stepped closer, she recognised Eudorus, sitting up against the side of the ship.

"Yes, thank you," she whispered. "I just needed some air."  
"My lord is sleeping?"  
She shrugged. "I wouldn't know," she said haughtily.  
Eudorus looked at her and then looked down, embarrassed.  
"Beg your pardon, majesty," he said.

Relta moved closer and sat down on the boards next to him, aware that she might have inadvertently caused him some discomfiture.  
Achilles had gone below deck, disappeared behind the curtain to her sleeping quarters – what else did the men think had happened?  
She pushed her lips up into a friendly smile to belie the anger she felt rising at the thought, the presumption.

Looking relieved, Eudorus pushed something towards her: a piece of cloth with some bread, cheese and olives on it.  
"Are you breaking your fast?" she smiled. "Or is it supper?"  
"Neither," he replied. "I don't like boats, never have. Takes me a while to find my sea legs."  
"Me too," she admitted.  
"Had no appetite earlier," he said. "But I woke up just there now because my stomach was growling. Try the cheese – it's from Kalios, you know You probably know it well."

She crumbled off a piece and ate it.  
The cheese was particularly good: soft and strong. The Kalions were absurdly proud of their cheese.  
"They say the cheese is so good because the goats are so happy," she said. "The only creatures that enjoy living up the side of that mountain are the goats, I think."  
Eudorus laughed softly.  
"You'll miss it, then?" he asked.

She thought about it.  
"I suppose so," she admitted. "But I never really intended to stay there in the first place."  
"No?" he offered her some olives and she took one.  
"I always thought I'd go back, back home."  
She pointed at the north-western heavens.  
"You're from the Western Isles, I hear. They say the people up there are wild savages."

She laughed softly, so as not to wake the men sleeping nearby.  
"Funnily enough, that's what we say about the people down here."  
Eudorus grinned. "And you want to go back, back to your savages?"  
"I do," she said, unable to keep the wistful tone out of her voice. "I plan to go back. Some day."

She tore off a corner of the bread and took a bite.  
"But tell me about you – are you from Phtia, too?" she asked.  
She didn't want to be questioned too closely about her return home. There was something about Eudorus' frank face that reminded her of Yanis, and she could never lie to Yanis.

"I am," he said proudly. "Most beautiful part of Greece. Green as the eye can see. You ever been to Phtia, my lady?"  
"No," she said, "but it sounds beautiful."  
"Maybe you might go one of these days," he said. "When this bloody war ends."  
"Maybe," Relta replied lightly.  
_Over my dead body,_ she thought. If she wanted green as far as the eye could see, she would wait till she got back to her own people.

"And how long have you served Achilles?" she asked.  
"Years," Eudorus said proudly. "I served his father, Peleus, when I was a youth. Younger than Patroclus. When he died, I swore my oath to Achilles and I have served him since."  
"He's lucky to have you," she said warmly. "You are very loyal. I had a man like you serve me once and he was ..."

She paused and tried to think about how to describe Yanis: dogged, sensible, level-headed Yanis. Curbing her husband's worst excesses, leading their tiny army into battle with a look of determination on his face, a set of inevitability to his shoulders.  
"... He was my right hand," she finished. "I imagine that is how Achilles sees you."  
Eudorus ducked his head modestly.  
"You're too kind, my lady."

They ate in silence for a few minutes, each crumbling a tiny piece of cheese or pulling apart the bread into little chunks.

Finally Eudorus said, "Achilles is a good master."  
"I have no doubt," she replied, smiling at him.  
There was a silence and he cleared his throat almost imperceptibly and tried again, but this time a note of urgency crept into his voice.  
"My lady, what I mean to say is that to serve him is no trial. He can be hard to deal with sometimes, but he is fair and he is respectful. Well, he's mostly respectful."  
She put down the piece of bread she was holding, feeling that familiar icy dread in her stomach.  
"Why are you telling me this, Eudorus?"  
"It's just that ... it's just that Agamemnon is ... he's not a good man, my lady. He treats his men well enough, that's true, but you have to do right by your soldiers or they'll fight you no wars. It's his slaves: he's ... _rough_ with his slaves."

The ice rose to her throat.  
She could not speak, just looked at him dumbly before she found her words.  
"I am a queen," she whispered. "I'm not destined to be one of Agamemnon's slaves."  
"You were made a queen," replied Eudorus, shifting uncomfortably, "And you lost your crown just as fast."

She opened her mouth, then closed it. She couldn't argue with that.  
He smiled at her wryly.  
"The camp is full of women that were once high-born ladies; aye, we even have a couple of former queens. One was married off to one of the Spartans for a particularly successful bit of killing and the other died of sickness not even two weeks in camp."  
She licked her lips, ready to say something, but nothing came out.  
"See," Eudorus said, pretending to concentrate on breaking off a piece of cheese so he wouldn't have to meet her eyes, "see, I always thought it best to choose the lesser of two evils. You know, when you're in a position with little choice, it's best to take control and make a choice yourself, before you have it made for you."  
"So Achilles is the lesser of two evils?" she asked through icy lips.

Eudorus looked appalled.  
"I didn't mean to imply he was evil, my lady!"  
"No, I understood what you meant. I'm to become some man's slave, so I should settle for the better of the two."  
She laughed softly and shook her head at the preposterousness of it all.

"Have I offended you, my lady?" Eudorus whispered, his brow furrowed in worry.  
"No, not at all. On the contrary, you have said exactly the captain of my guard would have said in your position."  
He wriggled awkwardly, deeply uncomfortable with the direction the conversation had taken.  
"I beg your pardon, my lady," he said. "If I have spoken out of hand, I truly ask for forgiveness. I just thought it best to warn you – "

She reached out in the darkness and patted his knee.  
"It's fine," she said. "It's good advice and given honestly. I appreciate it. I have two options and the only power I have at this time is to make that choice. I understand."  
Eudorus cleared his throat and got to his feet.  
"I had better ... I need to see to the ... to the thing," he stammered, "before dawn, before the others wake up."  
She smiled and nodded. "You do that," she said. "Thank you for the food. And the advice."

He left, making his way between the sleeping bodies far faster than she had.  
Relta wrapped the rest of the food carefully in the cloth and thought about what he had said.  
Yanis would have said the same thing, that's true, but Yanis would have added a caveat: _look for a third option. There is always a third option. It might not be obvious, but it will be there_.

She drew her knees up and wrapped her arms around them, and thought things through.  
Until she found the third option.

xXx

Achilles was still asleep.

He'd pushed the heavy cover off and lay naked on the narrow bunk.  
Relta pulled the curtain properly closed behind her and waited till her eyes had adjusted to the darkness.  
Then she surveyed him, taking in an inventory of his body, from his feet, to his thighs, his groin, his chest, his face.

In sleep he frowned slightly, moved his head.  
He was handsome, to be sure. Few women would balk at what she was about to do, but Relta hesitated, gathering her courage. Her wits.  
Then she slipped off her chiton and sat at the side of the bed, running a fingertip down from the dip between his breasts, over the muscles of his stomach, past his navel and down lower. He didn't wake but his mouth opened slightly, his breathing changed. She took his cock in her hand, moving gently up and down. When his eyelids flickered, she moved on top of him, lowering herself on his length.

His eyes shot open.  
"Quiet," she said and took his hands in hers. She placed them on her breasts and moved sinuously, raising her arms above her head with a lazy yawn.  
"What – ?"  
" _Ssh,_ " she whispered sharply.  
A wide grin spread across his face; she moved more quickly, loosening her hair about her shoulders.  
He reached up to touch it, then tried grabbed her thighs to try to move her beneath him.

Relta slapped his hands roughly.  
" _No_ ," she snapped and he dropped them quickly, still grinning at her.  
She moved silently above him as he ran his fingers up and down her back, her breasts, over her hips, his eyes dilated.  
When she felt she'd done enough, she stroked his face, and bit her lower lip in pretend passion.  
"Oh, Achilles," she said meekly. " _Mmm_. It's just - you're so _hard_ – "

It worked. It always worked.  
She bent over him, rubbed her cheek against his as his body juddered.  
Then Achilles groaned deeply, and she placed her lips against his ear. "Now you, my lord, have moaned for me," she whispered and dismounted.  
He made a sound between a gasp and a laugh.  
"Hey!" he cried and tried to grab her, but she slipped out of reach, stepping into her chiton and pulling it up swiftly.

"You were ... perfectly adequate," she said, not trying to hide a smile while busying herself with the ties. "Well done, you."  
She shot him a look, mustering him from head to toe. He lay back on the bed, shaking his head in incredulity.  
"You are a witch," he said admiringly.  
"So you keep telling me," Relta replied and pulled the curtain open so she could climb back up the ladder and watch the sun rise.


	9. 9

_Two options,_ Relta thought. _Become Agamemnon's slave. Or become Achilles' slave. Which is less distasteful, less repugnant?_

She picked up the robe that Patroclus had deposited shyly at her feet.  
She looked it over, stretching the material over her open hand, looking at the tear in the weave.  
Third option – most difficult of all - _make Achilles my slave. Make him enamoured of me, bend him to my will._

She looked up at Patroclus, who was standing bare-chested in front of her, one arm crossed self-consciously across his ribcage.  
"I can mend this," she said to him. "But it will take a little while. Perhaps you would like to put something else on."  
She glanced up at him with a pretence of shyness and said, "It would be easier to do it ... without distraction."

She ducked her head, feigning modesty.  
He drew a deep breath, blushed and stumbled off to find something else to wear.  
Relta tried to suppress a grin but when she looked up, she saw Eudorus staring at her, astonished. She winked at him and pored over her needle case, testing them for sharpness with her fingertip. She didn't have the right colour thread to mend the robe properly – Patroclus, in his haste to come forward to greet her, had caught the hem of his blue robe on a rivet of one of the kegs standing on deck – but she could sew the tear with some of the thread she had. It would give her something to do: everyone else on the ship was preparing for the day's labour and sails were being hoisted. All she could do was find a patch of shade and sit in as far out of the way as possible, plot her strategy to deal with the leader of the Myrmidons.

Having something to do with her hands was a welcome relief and gave her something to focus on while ignoring Achilles, which was not particularly easy.  
He had emerged on deck soon after her. Like most of the men, he had discarded his armour for a loose robe – but unlike the dun tones of the men's clothing, the cloth of his robe was cobalt blue of royalty, like his cousin's, and had an elaborate pattern picked out in small seed pearls.  
When he saw her, he grinned broadly, as though they shared some secret. She glanced up at him briefly and looked down, feigning disinterest.

She spread Patroclus' robe across her lap and saw that some of the tiny seed pearls had come loose, so she threw open her needle case again and looked through her threads for something suitable to affix them more firmly.  
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him staring at her while he spoke to Timon. He gave the man some order, then approached quickly, pointing out tasks for the men to do as he passed them.  
"You left quickly," Achilles said and she pretended to start, as though she had not noticed him coming.

He sank down on his haunches, so his face was level with hers.  
"I'm sorry?" she said, her face blank.  
"This morning," he replied and the same broad grin crossed his face, showing his dimples.  
_The grin of a man satisfied with himself_ , she thought. _Ugh_.

"I stayed long enough to get what I wanted," she said coolly.  
She gave him a brief smile and returned to her work, testing the pearls with her fingernail.  
"Tonight we can spend more time with each other," he said softly and stroked her shoulder with his thumb.  
She gave a curt laugh.  
"Hmm," she replied and moved her shoulder to slip out from beneath his touch.  
" _Hmm_?" Achilles repeated, an eyebrow raised.

Relta looked up at him, a pained expression on her face.  
"We'll see," she said finally.  
"We'll _see_?"  
"I apologise: Greek is not my first language," she said with mock concern. "Are you having difficulty understanding me?"

He sat back on his heels.  
"What do you mean by we'll see?" he asked.  
"I mean _we'll see_."  
She bit through the thread with her teeth and pulled it through the cloth for the next pearl. "I don't know if I'll really be in the mood, to be honest."

Achilles' laugh came out as a splutter and she glanced up at him, an eyebrow raised quizzically.  
"I will put you in the mood," he promised confidently.  
Relta raised her eyebrows silently, looked down at her work and said nothing.  
"You don't think I can?" he insisted when she did not reply.  
"Hmm," she said again. She checked her stitches studiously. "We'll see how I feel later on."

She looked up at him.  
His mouth was slightly open, a half-smile of incredulity on his face.  
"There wasn't much moaning," she whispered archly. "Not on my part, anyway."  
She shrugged and held up Patroclus' robe to inspect her work.  
"And as you don't force yourself on women, you can wait until I feel inclined to give you a chance to try again. Honestly, stuck on board a ship with dozens of sweaty, farty men? Not in the mood right now and less so after this morning."

She stood up and looked down on him, crouched before her, then bent and patted his shoulder comfortingly.  
"But, like I said, we'll see," she said with a condescending smile on her face.  
And then she walked off, Patroclus' robe gripped in her sweaty hands, her heart thumping like a drum in her chest.

She didn't look back, just smiled at the men that she passed, many of whom were looking at her with open-mouthed astonishment, having heard snatches of their conversation.  
She nodded at them regally and picked her way carefully to the stern, to return Patroclus' robe.

When she glanced around, she saw Achilles staring at her, shaking his head. When he caught her eye, he just mouthed one word: _Witch_.  
She rolled her eyes demonstratively and turned away.

xXx

"And then we came to Galicia," she said and pointed out the corner of Iberia on the map she'd drawn on the deck.

When Patroclus had asked her how she'd come to Greece, she'd found a piece of chalk and quickly sketched a map on the wooden boards. She'd studied her own map so often and so carefully that she could re-draw it from memory. It was accurate enough to make some of the sailors murmur in appreciation.

"From Galicia, we sailed to Carthage, but we had to stay there over winter, so it was sometime in spring before we got to Malta. And from there on to Greece."  
The line she drew stretched halfway around the known world, a thin white line that said nothing of the nights spent below deck in lurching storms, watching water leak through rotten boards, praying to all the gods and goddesses to be spared.  
"Why did you come to Greece?" Patroclus asked.

A small group of men had gathered around: they had heard each other's stories a thousand times; they were curious to hear hers.  
Relta shut her eyes for a second.  
Why did they come to Greece?  
"My father – my stepfather – was Greek. He came north to study the work of the astronomers. He stayed for a few years, met my mother and persuaded her to go back with him. She wouldn't leave without me – and that's how I came to be in Greece."

Like that, it sounded so simple.  
In truth, it was a little harder to explain: Aetius had spent years travelling further and further north from the warmth of the Greek sun, had made his way by land up through the tribes of Rome, Germania, Gaul and then across the choppy waters to her home. He had been looking for the druids and his search had driven him ever farther north till he found them. He had knowledge of the stars, he wanted to know about their gods and learn about their magic. There he had met her grandfather and married her mother, Flanna, who had fallen in love with this old man – old by anyone's standards. But Aetius cared for her and she adored him, and Relta never knew any father except him.

When Aetius decided that they would return to his home, there was no question that they would not go with him. After all, he had spent years teaching Relta – and, with lesser success, her mother – his language.  
His only concession to her mother's pleading was that they journey south by boat: she wanted to reach Greece before she was an old hag, she'd laughed. She'd like to see it in this lifetime, not the next.  
She would see it, Aetius promised, he would show her his home and she would love it.

But as it happened, Aetius arrived in Piraeus deathly ill.  
All of her mother's herbs, her magic, their incantations could not save him. He died before the first moon had waxed and waned, leaving them alone and penniless in a hot, sandy, foreign country.  
"How will we survive?" Relta had wailed.  
She was eleven; she wanted to go home. Back to where people didn't stare and pull at her hair, spit on their fingers and rub her skin.  
"We will survive on our wits," Flanna snapped. "You sound like one of them, you can translate for me. I will tell fortunes, communicate with their ridiculous gods. We will survive, trust me."

And they had survived, though not without difficulty at first. Her mother's magic was not a connection to the divine, nor was it rooted in any kind of spirituality: she had an uncanny talent for understanding what people needed to hear. If a woman turned up before her, twisting her robe anxiously, wanting to know if she would have a boy-child, the heir her husband so wanted, Flanna would murmur reassuring words about how Hera and Ilithyia would protect the passage of the child into the world and the child would be exactly what the gods wanted her to have. Her words were general, but sounded specific, she could tune her thoughts to the fears of the person in front of her, like a musician delicately adjusting a string.  
Relta watched and she learned.  
She learned to listen: not for what a person said, but what they did not say. She learned to watch their faces, their bodies, when they spoke, watched for the tiny movements that betrayed their thoughts when their words said something else.

It was not magic, oh no. It was anything but magic.  
They learned to talk their way out of anything: without any means, they were nearly pulled into slavery on more than one occasion. Her mother slept with any man that offered them protection – she could make her own coins, but she could not protect them from the world at large. Flanna smiled and wiled and wrapped men around her little finger, moving Relta from town to town, as far west as she could, in the hope that they could board a ship somewhere that would get them on their way back home.

And they had managed to get to Crete, which was no mean feat, but it was there that their luck turned.  
Flanna had become caught up with the entourage of a visiting king, a minor king of some place called Kalios. Flanna had performed her usual fortune-telling tricks for one of his ministers, then had ended up before the king to do the same and her charm had beguiled him. King Kalii of Kalios was a large man with a shaved head and eyes outlined with kohl. Even among the more magnificent Greek kings, he looked like a painted god.  
" _Péacóg_ ," her mother had whispered to her daughter, as she threw her rune stones and made predictions for his majesty.  
_Peacock_.  
This was a peacock king of a tiny kingdom that they had never heard of, but thought to be west of Crete. On the mainland? Near Ithaca? Closer to their goal than Crete, that was sure.

When Kalios insisted they return with him to serve in his retinue at his pleasure, Flanna had accepted with alacrity, gathering their meagre belongs so they could board the king's ships bound for the return to Kalios.  
It was only after a couple of hours at sea that the two northerners realised with horror that the ships were going east, not west.  
Relta, now nearly seventeen, had almost despaired, but her mother had promised that they would figure it out when they got there. They would not spend long in Kalios, wherever the accursed place was.  
But Flanna was, as usual, wrong.

xXx

"And now we are headed for Troy," Relta said, pointing to where she thought it was on her roughly-drawn map.  
Timon leaned in and corrected her, his dirty fingernail jabbing the board north of where she'd pointed.  
"Troy's there, my lady," he said.  
"Have you taken a village?" she asked curiously. "Where are the soldiers quartered?"

The men chuckled.

"Have you not heard about the siege of Troy?" one of them, Haemon, said. "I would've thought the stories had spread far and wide by now."  
"Of course – who hasn't?" she replied. "The messenger who came to Kalios said the troops had gathered on the beaches to attack. They said that Agamemnon had marched all the Greek kings into battle."  
"And we're still on the beaches," Eudorus said drily. "All of the Greek kings and all of their Greek men."

Her jaw dropped.  
" _Still_ on the beaches? It has been years!"  
" 'Course, we've taken land over the dunes. For the animals to graze. Some of the men who farm at home have planted crops. A few have married local women, if you'll believe that. Conquering the Trojans, but not quite the way Agamemnon planned."  
"But ... but how many men does Agamemnon command?"  
"Hundreds," said Patroclus.  
"Thousands," said Timon at the same time.  
"And they wait in their camps on the beaches of Troy, waiting to breach the walls?" Relta couldn't help but laugh in disbelief. "We heard stories ... but I presumed it was hyperbole. I didn't think – "  
She swallowed and the men nudged each other, grinning at her disbelief. "I didn't think he had been keeping thousands of men on a sandbank in Troy for years ... on a _whim_ ," she finished, looking up at them.

Eudorus stared at her, nodding his head significantly.  
"Thousands of men, my lady, and enough slave women to keep the entire camp ticking over."  
Small stars exploded in front of her eyes.  
"By all the gods," she said. "What a mess."

What was she being taken to? Some kind of hell?  
There was a sound of a throat being cleared and they all looked around.

Achilles was standing, staring at them, his hands on his hips. Relta couldn't tell how much he'd heard.  
"To the oars," he said. "The wind is dying."  
The men scattered, nodding at her, muttering, "My lady" as they took their leave.

She got up and stretched, arching her back like a cat, then walked past him, her head turning to smile graciously at the men at the oars.  
"Where are you going?" he asked gruffly. She looked up, stifling a yawn.  
"For a nap," she said and raised a finger imperiously when he moved. "Stay!"she snapped.  
He raised an eyebrow, opened his mouth to say something, but at that moment Patroclus called, "Cousin, look at this."  
Achilles hesitated, his eyes on hers.  
She met his gaze evenly, not looking away.  
"Well?" she said smoothly. "Off you go. The ship won't sail itself, you know."

She walked off before he could say anything else, hitching her robe above her ankles so she could make her way down the ladder to the bed below deck, where she sat, her knees shaking.


	10. 10

She spent the day the rest of the day sewing, moving from one shady place to the next.  
Instead of napping, she'd pulled open the chest Achilles had shown her and had pulled out the drapes, blankets and furs that had been torn off the walls and bed of her chamber and hastily stuffed in the large wooden box.

At the bottom were a couple of ceremonial robes she had once worn; she pulled out the dress she'd worn at her wedding ceremony. It was crumpled, rolled into a ball. Relta held in her hands briefly, feeling a little rueful. Was the ragged ball of a robe a metaphor for her existence as a queen? Worn out and discarded? she wondered. She smoothed out the white fabric and folded it, replacing it carefully in the chest.  
_You fool! Sentimental idiot!_ she chided herself and then thought, W _ho knows? The next time I see this, it might be worn by one of Agamemnon's concubines.  
_The thought made her laugh, a bubble of manic laughter that rose in her throat like bile.

She wriggled loose the rope that bound the chest beside it, pulling at the stiff buckles till her fingers were raw. Bracing herself against the ship's bobbing, she looked inside and found a selection of her chitons. Even in the half-darkness below deck, she noticed that her purple peploi and chitons had not been packed – nor had any of the colourful garments that she had worn in the palace and their rose garden, the ones her husband said made her look like a flower herself. Damaris had no doubt gone through her wardrobe and taken out the most costly pieces, the ones that had been exquisitely dyed and embroidered by Relta's own hand, leaving the plainer robes and the ones that had been torn to be packed up and sent to Troy. No doubt her two dumpy daughters were now wrapped up firmly in the former queen's fine linens, the purple casting dark shadows on their sallow skin.

Relta sighed and pulled out some clothing and put the pieces aside: a himation, the large cloak she would need for travelling, and a few plain linen robes that could be mended easily.  
At the bottom of the chest she spotted familiar material and she jumped on it, her heart rushing: it was a little yellow peplos Ana had worn. A dreadfully gaudy colour, as bright as the dyers could make it, a colour to rival the sun's - she'd hated it on her little daughter, but Kalios thought it was endearing.

And Yanis –well, Yanis had looked at the little girl with his dull eyes and smiled his mirthless smile.  
Relta pulled the cloth out and pressed it to her nose, hoping to smell her daughter, smell her scent. Instead, it smelled of the wood of the chest and lavender bags they kept inside to prevent the moths from attacking. 

Relta stood up, steadying herself, her arms full of linens and slipped back behind the curtain to Achilles' quarters.  
One peplos she tore into strips, then she soaked the linen in water from the jug on the floor and washed herself as best she could. From her pouch she pulled a small bottle of lavender oil. She mixed a few drops with a tiny bit of water and rubbed it on her skin, then combed out her hair and tied it back on the nape of her neck in a loose bun. Her skin was already covered in a sheen of sweat; the heat below deck was stifling.  
But she felt better; stronger; more able to face what was coming.

She folded the little yellow robe, rolling it tightly, and packed it in her pouch, stroking the linen with her fingertips, the way she used to stroke her daughter's arm.  
She fixed her robe as best she could and took up her small sewing bag, then picked her way back up the ladder with the linens under her arm, to find a shady place to sit and sew.

xXx

She sewed all day, till the light faded and her eyes grew tired.

First she repaired her own linens, then she started mending rips and tears on the men's. There was much ribaldry among the men as chitons were handed over and their half-naked owners were teased for their various physical failings, real or imagined.  
Relta sat, straight-backed, and smiled at them, laughing at their jokes. And silently, swiftly, sewed; mending the cloth and adding small rows of stitching in coloured thread to the hems.

And all the time, Achilles alternately watched her or ignored her. Every now and again she caught his eye and he nodded coolly at her before turning away.  
When evening drew in, he beckoned her to the bow of the ship and silently laid out a cloth over the top of a barrel. He put out much the same food as she'd shared with Eudorus the night before: the Kalion cheese, olives, bread. And a handful of grapes.

"Eat," he commanded curtly.  
She helped herself to bread and cheese, smiling at Patroclus when he joined them.  
She pushed the cheese towards him, then turned to his cousin.  
"When will we arrive in Troy?" she asked.  
"The day after tomorrow," Achilles answered. "If the winds hold. We will catch up on Odysseus tomorrow; we keep sighting his ship on the horizon. He'll wait for us so we can land together."

She pulled a grape off the stalk, and ate it thoughtfully.  
"You will stay with me in Troy," Achilles said to her.  
"As your guest," Relta reminded him.  
He didn't answer, just tore off some bread.  
Patroclus looked from her to Achilles and said, "What will Agamemnon say, cousin?"  
"Do I look like someone who cares?" Achilles replied coldly. "I found her, she's mine."

Relta cleared her throat. "Your _guest_ ," she said again, more firmly.  
" _Our_ guest," Patroclus repeated, an anxious note in his voice."A guest of the Myrmidons."  
"A guest of the Myrmidons?" Achilles chuckled. "And how satisfied have you been with my hospitality so far, my lady?" he asked mockingly.  
"Delighted," she replied in the same tone. "My lord has been very – " she paused, searching for words. "- eager to please."

She gave him a bright, brittle smile.  
Patroclus again looked from one to the other, not quite understanding the exchange.

"What is your name, my lady queen?" Achilles said.  
He pushed the grapes towards her and she plucked off a few more.  
"I don't believe we were ever properly introduced."  
"Relta."  
"Relta?"  
She nodded.  
"What kind of name is that?"  
Relta shrugged. "The same kind of name as Achilles," she retorted. "One my parents gave me."  
"Yes, but what does it mean?" Achilles demanded.

She swallowed the olive she'd been chewing.  
" _Stars_ ," she said softly. " _Réalta_ means _stars_. But no one can manage that down here, so you people call me Relta. It could be worse, I suppose."  
She smiled up at Patroclus, who was watching her intently.

"Why did your people name you that?" he asked.  
"The night I was born, a huge star crossed the black sky, a _réalta na scuabe._ "

She tried to explain it, the star that had marked her birth-night.  
"It left a streak of silver behind it and my mother said it was my path down from the stars. So she called me Réalta."  
She turned to the north and pointed at the heavens. "My father and grandfather were astronomers; they studied the stars. So I suppose it's in my blood."  
The first stars began to twinkle in the clear sky.  
"That's ... _the way of the white cow_ ," she said, pointing at the smattering of stars that left a milky smudge across the sky. " _Bealach na Bó Finne_."

Saying the words made her homesick. She'd spoken to no one in her own language since her mother had left; she'd tried to speak it to her daughter, but the older she got, the less inclined Ana was to speak her mother's out-landish language.  
The two men chuckled and she smiled at them.  
"Think how stupid I find your terms," she grinned. "This one, you call the lion? It doesn't look like a lion. Unless you're drunk. We call that _an corran_ , the reaping hook. See how the stars arch? That's the hook. And that, there, is _réalta colais_ , the star of knowledge. The one that leads north."

She tried to steady her voice, so the longing wouldn't come through. The star of the north: if she just followed that star, she would be heading home.  
Achilles was watching her carefully, his head dipped to one side.  
"My people also call it _an gaelin_. The one that shows the way home," she said, turning her face from the men.  
Her true star, the point of light she could always turn to, to show her the way back. Her eyes sought it out; it shone enticingly. _This way,_ it said. _Follow me._

"Is it true you are a witch?" Patroclus asked eagerly, breaking the stillness.  
Relta laughed out loud. "Maybe," she teased. She glanced up at Achilles. "Your cousin thinks I am."

He rolled his eyes, trying not to smile.  
"Do you want to finish this, Patroclus?" he said, indicating the rest of the food. "If not, give it to the men. They can have more wine tonight; we row hard tomorrow. I want to be in Troy as soon as we can."  
Patroclus, his mouth full, nodded.

Achilles stepped away and extended a hand.  
"My lady," he said. "We retire."  
She hesitated. "I'm not tired," she said with a smile. "But thank you."  
"My _lady_ ," he repeated and there was a note of warning in his voice.

She sighed theatrically and he held out his hand.  
"Come," he said firmly.  
"Good night, Patroclus," Relta said gently.  
The younger man was standing to the side, his mouth agape.  
With a sinking heart, she realised that he probably hadn't figured out what his cousin had planned for her.  
"Well?" Achilles said to him, annoyed. "She is _my_ guest, after all."  
"Y-yes," his cousin stammered. "Good night."

When Relta glanced back at him, he was standing, downcast, by the side of the ship, picking disconsolately at the bread and cheese.  
Achilles led her down the gang plank, moving carefully between the men, who wouldn't meet her eye any more. She tried to wriggle her hand out of his, but his grip was firm. He climbed down the ladder, held out his hands to catch her when he followed. Behind the curtain, he indicated that she should get into the bed first, but she hesitated.

"What?" he said and shrugged off his robe.  
He was naked; she glanced away as he reached up to pull off the leather strap that held his hair back.  
_The gods must amuse themselves greatly at my expense,_ she thought bitterly. _First they send me a man to sleep with who does not want me, then they send me a man to sleep with whom I want not._

He scratched his head idly and then clicked his fingers, an amused grin crossing his face.  
"What are you waiting for? I've seen you without any clothes. As I recall, you were the one who decided to show me."  
"And I will be the one who will decide to show you again," she snapped. "Or not. As the case may be."  
"Fine," he said.

He lay down on the bed, kicking off the covering she'd taken from the trunk.  
Relta briefly thought about lying down on the floor beside his bed but caught herself in time: she was not his pet, lying by his bed like a dog.  
"Move over," she ordered, pulling her robe around her more tightly. He moved an inch, maybe two.  
She lay down on her side at the edge of the bed. Achilles moved closer, pressing against her, his arm crossing her waist to pull her in closer.

"You smell nice," he said into her hair.  
She shut her eyes and feigned sleep. He laughed softly and she felt his warm breath against her skull, the hardness of his body pressing against her.  
Involuntarily, she felt herself respond and caught her breath, trying to remain still as her heart beat faster.  
His large hand stroked the skin of her arm, tracing a line from her shoulder to her elbow.  
She lay frozen, trying not to move a muscle, as her skin rose in goosebumps under his touch.

"My mother once told me that my future was in the stars," he murmured and moved his hips against her.  
"Well, not in this damned star," she snapped and squirmed away as fast as she could.  
With a small gasp, she accidentally rolled over the side of the bed and landed on the floor, her tailbone banging against the wooden boards.

His loud laugh echoed in the darkness and a few of the men above laughed in return.  
"I think I'll sleep here," she said stiffly.  
Achilles leaned over the side of the bed, his head propped up in one hand.  
"My bed in Troy is big enough for us both," he promised. "And for anything you wish to do to me in it," he added suggestively.  
" _Anything_ I wish to do to you in it?" Relta repeated, spreading the cover on the boards so she could lie on it. "I can think of a few things I would wish to do to you in it. And at least two of them involve fire."  
"Ooh, I can't wait," he whispered and turned back to the wall.

She heard him laugh in the darkness and, to her shame, found it hard to stop herself from grinning as well.


	11. 11

*Thank you for reading along! And if you are, please consider leaving a comment; I'd love to hear from you.*

What was that feeling?  
Eudorus couldn't quite put his finger on it, but it niggled him like an itch.

The weather had been favourable – almost impossibly favourable.  
Steady wind when they needed it and a glassy calm sea when they drew up alongside the Ithacan boat.  
The men said it was the White Queen: she'd called up that storm after all. She could convene with her star-gods, she probably could control the weather. Eudorus had tried to quash the nonsense, but monotony fuels a good story and after several days at sea, having a weather-manipulating witch-queen on board made for far more exciting idle talk than simply having good luck with the winds.

He watched Odysseus jump on board, Achilles grabbing his arm to steady him as his bare feet hit the deck. He watched the two men laugh, embrace, saw their heads bent in steady conversation. Then he stood by as Achilles clapped his friend on the back and led him to the trap-door that led below deck, throwing open the door so Odysseus could climb down.

What was that feeling?  
Relief.  
The feeling was relief.  
Odysseus would surely talk some sense into his master, loosen that woman's grasp on him. Odysseus was a fair man, had a steady mind and unerring good sense. Eudorus nodded to himself, satisfied; relieved.

Achilles caught his eye and beckoned him to come over, so he scurried across the crowded deck to do his bidding.  
"Go down there and make sure he ... doesn't wake her," he said and nodded at the ladder.  
Make sure Odysseus didn't wake her? Make sure she didn't bat her eyelashes at the Ithacan king and bewitch him too, more like.  
"My lord," he said and went down the ladder to find the king.

xXx

"Ah," Odysseus said.  
He had his back to Eudorus, but when the king heard his footsteps, he let the curtain drop into place and uttered that one sound, that noise of comprehension that was at the same time somehow also a sigh.

Odysseus turned around and saw Achilles' warrior behind him. He shook his head silently and pushed past him, climbing back up the rungs.  
Eudorus followed.

"Well?" Achilles said, grinning. "What do you think of her now?"  
Odysseus cleared his throat.  
"In truth," he began, "I had hoped – "  
He paused to find the words.  
"I had hoped you would leave her behind in Kalios. Let her go."  
"Why would I let her go? She has value."  
"To Agamemnon, friend. Why take her with you? She fought well, she doesn't deserve to be dispatched into slavery. I would've let her go; accidentally looked away and let her go off on her own merry way."  
"She has value," repeated Achilles stubbornly.  
"To whom?" his friend countered but the Myrmidon said nothing. 

Odysseus glanced at Eudorus for support, but Eudorus knew his place: he glanced over the king's shoulder, staring at the horizon.  
"He will make you hand her over, you know that," the king said finally.  
"He can't have her," Achilles replied shortly.  
He smiled at his friend, his good humour slightly dampened by the lack of enthusiasm he was receiving.  
Odysseus tugged his beard.

"How will this play, Achilles? You arrive in Troy with the Kalion she-wolf and parade her in front of Agamemnon, just to drive him insane?" Odysseus' voice rose in annoyance. "Why not just fuck her in front of his tent? Do you see what this will do? He will not rest till he has her, if only to make sure you do not."  
"Well, then, fighting me for my woman might distract him from fighting Paris for his brother's," Achilles remarked drily. "Nothing like a bit of variety after a few years on that damned beach. Excuse me," he said and walked over to Arnon, the navigator, who was carrying out a shouted conversation with the navigator on Odysseus' boat.

The Ithacan king turned to Eudorus, throwing his hands up in despair.  
"What was he thinking?" he said. "Why on earth did he bring her on board?"  
Eudorus shrugged. "The men say she has cast a spell on him."  
"And has she? Is she a witch, like they say?"  
"No more than any other member of her sex," Eudorus said carefully.

Close to dawn every morning so far, the White Queen had emerged on deck at the time he first broke his fast and she sat silently beside him, sharing his bread. He noticed that she did not flirt with him, did not look up at him with that pretend-shyness that she saved for the other men, but sat quietly and asked him whispered questions about the camp at Troy, about the battles they had already fought. He'd tried not to engage with her, but he could not be rude and not answer a queen's questions, so he found himself talking to her, telling her about the encampment, the other kings, the warriors' lives ... telling her far more than he intended to. She would sit there, staring at him with her blue eyes in a frown of concentration, hanging onto his every word.  
Maybe she was a witch, after all?

"What has she done to him?" Odysseus said.  
"I don't know," Eudorus replied. "She makes him... We hear them... He laughs with her."  
"Laughs? Achilles laughs?"  
The incredulity rang in every word.  
"Yes, sire, we hear them laughing in the morning below deck. Then he emerges with that ... with that grin on his face."

Odysseus pulled his beard again. "And what about her? Does she do any grinning?"  
"Not exactly," Eudorus stammered. "She more or less ignores him. She talks to the men and sews and draws – "  
"Draws?"  
Eudorus pointed down. The boards of the deck were covered in chalk, smeared and half-wiped away by footprints and spills.  
"She draws the stars, the constellations. She draws the maps, the coastline, whatever the men ask. Arnon says she's good, as good as any man."  
"So she sits on board the deck and draws her little pictures while he walks around grinning." Odysseus shook his head in disbelief. "Their nights must be filled with all kinds of delight," he said sardonically. "Especially if he wakes up with that smirk on his face."  
"Eh," Eudorus' cheeks pinkened. "Well, see, that's the funny thing – "  
"He hasn't - ?"  
"We don't know, sire. She sleeps on the floor at night and during the day she goes down and sleeps in the bed."  
The Ithacan king stared at him.  
"I don't understand," he said.  
"Neither do I, my lord. She's playing with him, somehow. And I'd wager it amuses him."

Odysseus laughed and across the deck, Achilles looked up and caught their eyes. He raised a hand to show he would be back in moment.  
"Aye, I can imagine," he said wryly. "That'd be something new for Achilles. Well, that goes some way to explaining why he wants to keep her. The gods know that the man likes a challenge."

He glanced at the Myrmidon, sensing Eudorus had something else to say.  
"She will leave him, my lord," Eudorus said. "At the first possible opportunity, she will bolt and, mark my words, she will be gone."  
"How do you know this?" Odysseus asked, his eyes narrowed.  
"She wants to go back to her own people. She has a daughter somewhere and I think she's planning to join her. I'd wager that she'll have disappeared within a week of reaching Troy."

Achilles said something to Arnon and started to make his way back over to them.  
"He will not like that," Odysseus murmured.  
"No, my lord."  
"And neither will Agamemnon."  
"No, my lord."  
"Neither will Agamemnon what?" Achilles asked, approaching.  
"Like the fact that you have that his she-wolf among your cargo," Odysseus replied quickly.  
"My she-wolf," his friend contradicted him. And he grinned broadly again, clapping an arm around his friend's shoulders.  
"You are a fool, Achilles," Odysseus said, unmoved by his jollity. "You will start another war on the beaches of Troy. And Prince Hector will sit back and watch us burn."


	12. 12

"Please," Relta begged. "Please, no. I will...I'll ..."  
She didn't know the Greek word for 'suffocate' and that made her panic even more.  
"I can't breathe in there," she said finally. Her voice wobbled; she tried to steady it but failed.  
Achilles smiled at her.  
"Timon has drilled holes to let you breathe," he said reassuringly. "You just have to lie still under the furs and you'll be fine."

He smiled down at her. He was in his battle armour again, the gold breastplate resplendent in the sun.  
She banged the metal, as though knocking on a door, and felt her panic rise: trapped in a chest, like a coffin, covered in her winter furs? She'd die of the heat if she didn't suffocate first. The chest was one of the heavier ones, used to store the winter bedding. It was functional: plain, heavy wood with little decoration. Achilles had thought it less likely to be searched than one of the ornate ones that had stood in the bedroom or withdrawing room.  
"You'll be brought straight to my tent," he said. "I promise."  
He cupped her cheek with his hand and she tried not to recoil.  
"Don't you trust me?" he asked.  
Stupid man, she thought. Doesn't he realise by now that I don't trust anyone?

He had woken her that morning to tell her of the scheme he'd cooked up in the middle of the night.  
The previous day, the king of Ithaca – the wily one with the clever eyes – had told her in no uncertain terms what would happen when they landed in Troy. She would either have to be handed over to Agamemnon or Agamemnon would take her. Either way, there would be bloodshed if Achilles didn't comply and Achilles, his chin jutting out stubbornly, had made it clear that he would not.  
"What if – " she began, feigning thoughtfulness, "... what if you just let me go? I could stay on board till the ship has been unloaded and just slip away. If you tell me which way to go – "  
"No," Achilles had snapped. "You are my guest, my lady."  
She'd looked up at Odysseus silently, pleadingly, but he shook his head and laughed a silent laugh, his teeth gritted in a mirthless grin.  
"We land tomorrow," he said to Achilles sardonically. "Maybe before then you can think of some way to make Agamemnon give her to you voluntarily. That would solve all of our problems."  
Achilles nodded, his blond braids falling forward as he bowed his head in thought.  
"Good luck with that," Odysseus muttered and turned to take his leave of the men.

So Achilles had obviously taken him at his word.  
She was woken as he always woke her, his hand pulling back the thin linen cover, drifting over her breasts as though he was stroking a cat.  
"Pest," she mumbled and he laughed out loud. His laughter was always unexpected: a deep bark of a laugh, as though he were surprised by it himself.  
"Go away, you nuisance," she said, pushing his hand off.  
She turned on her side, her every muscle screaming after hours on the hard floor. She usually got up in the predawn light to eat with Eudorus, then crept back to her makeshift bed before his master awoke.  
And the Myrmidon prince usually awoke just after she had drifted – finally – back to sleep.

Achilles' hand moved down over her hips, closing briefly over her hipbone, then moved down to her buttocks. She rolled away and he laughed again, then got down on to the floor beside her, pulling her into his arms so he could press his face into her hair, crush her in his arms. Then he whispered his plan in her ear.  
"It won't work," she said.  
"It will."  
"It won't."  
"Wait and see."  
Fine for you, she thought sourly. You won't be handed over to that fat old pig king if – when – it goes wrong.

But she said nothing.  
"How do you sleep on this floor?" he whispered. "It's so hard. Or do you just like it ... hard?"  
And he pressed himself against her.  
She wriggled out of his grasp and he let her go, lying on the floor on his back, his hands behind his neck. Relta crawled over him to the bed, not looking back. She always tried to avoid looking at him naked; he was disconcerting, and he knew it. Sometimes in the morning if he caught her glance while he pulled on his robe, he said nothing, just smirked his stupid smile and sauntered off.

She got into the bed, still warm from the heat of his body, still smelling like him.  
"Go away," she said again. "I want to arrive in Troy well-rested. I need my sleep."  
She turned to the wall and listened to him chuckling as he climbed up the ladder.

xXx

Whoever was carrying the chest weren't making much effort to do so carefully; or perhaps Achilles had told them to treat the chest the same as the others, so as not to arouse suspicion. Inside, her head was whacked against the side of the box as they threw it down on the sand. She stuck her nose against one of the small holes and drew deep breaths, trying not to panic. She was lying in a foetal position, covered by a selection of older furs. Wolfskin smelled, smelled so bad. She had always hated that scent, now she was trapped in it. Embalmed in it: the heat was unbearable; she was sweating profusely. Through the hole at eye level she saw legs passing by, then the chest was yanked roughly and picked up again, moved few metres away.

To her horror, she saw a chariot coming up the beach. She peered closer, squinting to see who it was. Beside the driver, in full armour, was that rotund little man who called himself the king of kings. The chariot swerved out of sight and all she could hear was his voice.  
"Achilles!" he roared.  
"My lord," Achilles replied in his dry tone and she started at his proximity. He was obviously standing next to the chest.  
"What took you so damned long? The Trojans got wind of your absence and they have been hammering us for days. Now Hector has gathered his forces and my spies tell me that they are preparing to launch another attack!"  
"That is unfortunate, my king," Achilles replied smoothly.

He didn't even try to keep the sarcasm from his voice.  
Absurdly, Relta began to feel a bit sorry for Agamemnon: Achilles was clearly fond of instigating disquiet and she immediately knew that the younger man's pretend ennui would drive the hot-headed little king insane.  
"Well? What are you standing around waiting for? Come on, you fools!" Agamemnon growled.  
There was no reply, so Relta assumed Achilles had treated the king to one of his haughty nods.

She braced herself, waiting for someone to move the chest, then heard some muffled noise.  
The king shouted, "Is this all the tribute that little pup could send me? Are the goldworkers of Kalios blind? I wouldn't put this ugly shit on my horse!"  
There was a clatter of metal on metal, and she presumed that some of Kalios' substandard goldworking was being tossed around.  
"And what's this?" She heard Agamemnon's hoarse laugh. "The bitch's clothes? They send me the bitch's clothes? What good is this to me without the bloody queen herself?"  
"She wasn't at the castle when we got there." Odyssesus' voice, clear and steady, came from somewhere behind the chest. "They told us she'd left days before."  
"No doubt that slippery little whore got out of there as fast as her skinny legs could carry her," Agamemnon said. "Well, men, load up the chests and take them to my hall. I'll look at them later and see if there is anything in there worth keeping or whether I should have the whole damned lot melted down. Eupharius: share the robes out among the women and make sure they share fairly. I have no need for another fight."

"Wait a minute," Achilles said angrily. Relta saw his leg come into sight as he walked around the side of the chest. "What is our share? Without us, you would have nothing. We sailed to Kalios, we negotiated with the king."  
"We endured the most odious banquet you can imagine," Odysseus said lightly. "For that alone, my king, we deserve some gold."  
"Aye, you do," Agamemnon replied. "You led the expedition. Achilles had no right or claim to any of the tribute."  
Relta could only see his calf, but even through the tiny peephole of the chest, she saw his skin bristle and could only imagine his fury.  
"We have a right to our share," Achilles said loudly. "My men and I."  
"Odysseus will see that his part is divided amongst you and your men."  
"That is not enough."  
"Achilles," she heard Odysseus say in a placating tone. "Come now, friend, there is enough for everyone."  
"I get my share or I will not fight," Achilles said. "Hector can march down on the beach for all I care."

She heard Agamemnon laugh.  
"Fine. Take this one – I have no need of more goblets and these ones look like something Zeus shat out. You need some clothes for your whores? Take these – my women wouldn't be seen dead in them. And what's in here?"  
The chest shook and she froze. There was a creak and the lid was thrown open, banging against the side. She steeled herself not to move.  
"Furs," Achilles said sullenly. "But you can have them. They're only wolf and wolf pelts stink."

She felt a fur being lifted and heard Agamemnon laugh.  
"The she-wolf's furs! Well, that's something, at least. They can't even trap a decent fur up the side of the mountain, can they? I'll take one as a trophy and the rest you can have as a souvenir of your trip."  
"Oh, this is generous, my king of kings: this worthless chest is mine? Mine to keep?"  
"Yes, and you can keep the furs as well, good Achilles. There! Who could say that I am not magnanimous?"  
"Most magnanimous, my king."  
His tone was dripping with sarcasm.  
"Happy now? Gather your men and get moving!"  
Achilles moved aside, freeing her view. She saw Agamemnon's chariot start up the beach and the men fell in behind him.  
There was a bang on the lid of the chest and she jumped.  
"Take this to my tent," she heard Achilles' voice command.  
At that moment she realised that she could release the breath that she'd been holding. She put her face against the holes and gasped for air.

xXx

The chest was placed roughly on the ground and she waited, unsure of whether to move. The interior of the tent – for she presumed she was in Achilles' tent – was dark. She hesitated, weighing up whether to push open the lid.

Suddenly, it was thrown open and rough hands pulled at the furs. They were yanked off her, exposing her face, and she was suddenly eye to eye with a wizened little face.  
"Ai!"

Relta sat up, scrambling out from under the furs.  
Beside the trunk was a tiny woman with a wrinkled face, her skin dark but her hair white, her tiny hands clutched to a bony chest. She said something in a language Relta did not understand and then she turned to run, but Relta grabbed her skinny arm and pulled her back, trying to climb out of the chest without letting her go.

"Stop," she whispered desperately. "Stop, please. Or I'll have to kill you."  
Standing up, she was at least a head taller than the tiny woman, whose little bones she could feel in her fingers' grip. Could she kill her? Probably, but she had no taste for killing and not for killing a woman as old as this.  
"I'm here with Achilles," she whispered, then revised it when the woman's face crumpled in confusion. "Achilles brought me here."  
"Achilles?" the woman said.  
"Yes! Yes, Achilles. He brought me here. I'm his guest."

The woman's face wrinkled in confusion.  
"His guest," Relta repeated desperately. "But it's a secret. A secret, do you understand? Shh."  
She placed a finger to her lips and shushed theatrically.  
The women nodded.  
"Ah, for Achilles," she said. Then she made some swooshing moves with her hand. "Achilles."  
"Yes, I know," Relta said. "They're fighting. Agamemnon sent them to fight."  
"You here, for Achilles?"  
"Yes."  
"A secret?"  
"Yes."  
By the gods, she thought. This is exhausting.

The old woman looked at her, then seemed invigorated.  
"For Achilles," she said conclusively. "A secret."  
"Yes," Relta said, glad she was finally being understood.  
The old lady looked Relta up and down, pinching her nose in disgust.  
"Yes, I smell," she admitted. "Bad. I smell bad."  
"Bad, bad," the woman agreed, feeling her hair. She undid her plaits and rubbed Relta's hair through her fingers like cloth, then pinched her arms, her buttocks.  
"Hey," she said, stepping away. "Stop that."  
"Wash now," the old woman said. "Wash. Yes?"  
"Yes," Relta replied with relief. "Oh, yes, please."

The old woman left the tent and returned with two pails of water balanced on a yoke across her back.  
She was surprisingly strong, Relta thought.  
The pails were placed carefully in the sand, then the old woman pulled out a large shallow bowl that was big enough for her to stand in, not unlike a serving platter. The dark woman leaned over and yanked Relta's chiton, which she grabbed and clutched to her chest.  
"Stop," she whispered. "I can wash myself."  
"No," the old woman said, a determined look on her face.  
Glancing at the door, Relta dropped her robe and stood awkwardly in the little bath while the woman soaped her down. She closed her eyes while the old lady removed any body hair she thought extraneous with the blade of a sharp knife, pinching her sharply when Relta yelped at a nick. Then she made her kneel while she roughly soaped her hair. Without warning, a pail of water was tipped over her head and Relta knelt miserably on the hard metal, watching the water slop over the side and into the sand. The old woman combed out her hair, hissing at the tangles – more pinches when Relta complained – and plaited it away from her face.

Relta perched on the edge of the bed, an arm across her chest to cover her nakedness, while the old woman rooted through a chest pushed up against the wall. She pulled out a robe and Relta recognised the seed pearl patterning.  
It was one of Achilles'.  
She tried to protest but the old woman pulled it down over her head and pulled her arms out through the sleeves. It was far too big for her, but better than nothing, because the old woman had already picked the dirty chiton up with the tips of her fingers and deposited it demonstratively outside the door. Relta opened her mouth to protest but the woman disappeared, returning moments later with a tray of food and a jug of wine.

"Eat, drink, wait Achilles," the woman ordered.  
"Fine," she repeated sulkily. "Eat, drink, wait Achilles."  
The woman stood back and surveyed her handiwork proudly.  
"Now," she said. "You nice. For Achilles."  
Relta snorted.  
"I'm sure he'll be delighted," she said, aware her sarcasm was lost on the dark woman. She was right; the old lady watched her eat ravenously, nodding, then she withdrew from the tent, pausing at the door.  
"Very nice, for Achilles," the woman said happily. "Nice secret. Very nice."

Relta looked up from her meat, realisation dawning.  
"I'm not his present," she said indignantly. "I'm his guest."  
"Yes," the woman agreed. "Very good present. For Achilles."  
She smiled at Relta and raised a thumb in approval.  
"Eat, drink, wait Achilles. Very nice."  
She dropped the curtain into place and disappeared.


	13. 13

Relta peeked out from behind the curtain.  
The camp appeared quiet: a couple of men at the shore were repairing nets; when one turned his head in her direction, she silently withdrew back into Achilles' tent. She heard a dull, distant roar and she recognised it as the sound of battle. Biting her lower lip in thought, Relta decided that she needed to explore – and what better time than when every able-bodied man was out at Troy's gates, fighting the Trojan army?

She rifled through Achilles' things, pulling back the covers on his bed. Next to the washbowl, she found a neat stack of white linens and she pulled one out, shaking it to assess its size. Big enough to cover her hair, she wound it around her head and tied it in a knot at the nape of her head, then she dipped her fingers in the ashes of the fire and smudged her face. Before leaving the tent, she grabbed a large urn and heaved it onto her shoulders, then marched off purposefully, as though she had someplace to go.

The beach was dotted with tents similar to Achilles' and some of the ships had been transformed into residences, resplendent in the colours of the kings that inhabited them. She recognised the banners of Agamemnon and steered a wide berth.  
Animals were penned, ready for the slaughter, and a couple of small children played nearby, their mother sitting in the entrance of a modest tent, fanning herself in the heat. She looked curiously at Relta as she passed but Relta didn't look back, instead she kept her head down and kept moving. 

The Greeks appeared to have settled, appeared to have achieved a sense of domesticity in the most bizarre of circumstances. It was a testament to Agamemnon's tenacity: he had dug his heels into the Trojan sand and he clearly was not planning to leave until his brother's wife was returned or the walls of Troy had been destroyed.

Along the sand dunes, groups of people had gathered: women, older men, some children. Some had covered their eyes or turned away; others were intently watching the spectacle before them. The women wore chitons of different colours: some had draped black cloths over their shoulders, which Relta took to indicate their belonging to the Myrmidons. Purposefully avoiding them, she deposited the urn in the sand and slowly climbed to the top of the sandbank, slipping in between another group of women who were watching the battle silently, wringing their hands.

Relta had forgotten the noise: the swell of noise that rose and fell as the wind blew in their direction and away again. She smelled the dust; she fancied she caught the dull metallic smell of blood.  
As she watched, she saw soldiers pulling away from the ranks of Agamemnon's fighters and a roar went up from the battlefield.

"They are losing," one of the women said to no one in particular.  
"But they have Achilles now," another replied.  
She was grasping the material of her robe in both hands, her face rapt.  
"He came too late," the first woman said. "The Myrmidons came too late."  
"Agamemnon's pulling them back!" came a cry from down the dune and it spread like wildfire: they're retreating! Agamemnon's pulling back!  
"Will Hector storm the camp?"

The whispers flew through the onlookers, but no one moved.  
"They're too close to the city," the first woman said. "They're in range of their archers."  
"The Myrmidons will not retreat," the other woman replied confidently. "Achilles would rather die than retreat."

Relta felt her heart stop a moment: Achilles might die?  
She glanced around, unsure what to do. If Achilles were to die, she would have to leave now, this instant.  
"They're retreating!" came a cry.  
"If Agamemnon tells him to retreat, he will retreat," the first woman said firmly. "He is Agamemnon's war-dog, after all."  
"Shush," the second woman replied, looking around anxiously. She caught Relta's eye and looked away. "He is a great warrior. A noble warrior."  
"And he must do what his liege lord says," the first woman said. "So he will retreat."

As a mass, the crowded battlefield seemed to shudder, the warriors started to pull back, foot soldiers rushing and pushing to get back into safe distance of the camp.  
"Won't Hector attack?" Relta said.  
She felt as though she were poised on the tips of her toes, ready to run.  
The two women looked at her curiously.  
"He has suffered too many losses," the first woman said. "He would be a fool to attack the camp now. Besides, the sun is setting. It's to his disadvantage to attack at dusk."

Relta nodded; in the far distance she saw the huge Trojan gates open and the warriors started to pull back into the city. She low sun glinted against the warriors' armour and she shielded her eyes against the glare.  
"We'd best get back before they do," the second woman said. "There will be a long queue at the well but Mitiades won't be pleased if there is not water to wash with."

Slowly, the onlookers started down the sand dunes and Relta followed in the group, her head down. She tried to remember where she'd put the urn but in the surge of people, it was difficult to figure out whether it had been by this small tent or further down the beach by that one. She was just trying to remember when a hand grabbed her elbow and squeezed it tightly.  
It was Patroclus.

"What are you doing here?" he hissed.  
He was wearing his armour – or better said, he was dressed for battle but wore no helmet and carried no weapon.  
"What are you doing here?" she countered. "Have you... are you come from the battlefield?"  
He looked down at her and a fleeting look of pain crossed his face.  
"My cousin ordered me to stay here," he said.  
"Why?"  
"To look after you," he admitted sulkily.

She looked up at his smooth face and suppressed the desire to stroke his boyish cheek.  
"You didn't do a very good job of it," she smiled.  
"I didn't think you'd try to run away," Patroclus said, walking down the beach.  
He still held her elbow and she scurried alongside him, trying to keep up. Wordlessly he took the heavy urn and swung it in his free hand.  
"I wasn't trying to run away," Relta replied honestly.  
I was just figuring out how I could run away, she added in her head.  
"You wanted to see him fight?" he asked.  
"Yes," she lied.  
The last thing she wanted to see was the blond man fighting, slashing his way through Trojan bodies. That was the stuff of nightmares.  
"Are you going to tell him that I left you alone?" he said, suddenly stopping so he could face her.  
"No," she replied quickly. "Of course not."

Patroclus nodded, his face relieved, then continued on his way. Men were trickling down the dunes, their faces bloodied. Some were helped by friends, their open gashes leaving a trail of blood down the sand. She saw one man who was being half-dragged, half-carried by his comrades. A wound sliced open his stomach and his intestines were visible.  
Sickened, Relta looked away.

"Wait there till he comes back," Patroclus commanded.  
He pulled back the leather curtain and jerked his head at the darkness of the interior.  
Relta hesitated.  
"Go in," Patroclus said, then added softly, "Please."  
She went inside, blinking against the darkness.  
"How do you know he will return?" she asked the shadowy form of his cousin in the doorway.  
"He always returns," he replied confidently.

xXx

She removed the head cloth and looked around.  
"What now?" she wondered aloud.  
So she sat cross-legged on the bed and waited.  
The noise outside increased: men shouting, metal clanking. Suddenly the curtain was pulled back and Achilles entered the tent, ducking his head in the low doorway. His face was a bloody mask, his arms and legs were red. His armour had a dull, wet sheen and she smelled that smell – metallic and sharp.

His blue eyes shone out of the mess on his face as he looked her over.  
Relta felt stunned; she could barely drag her eyes away from him. He looked like a god of carnage, a god of death, and she remembered what the priestess had said about him in the temple of Aphrodite: his eyes were empty and remorseless.  
They were the black of despair.

Achilles looked away, shed his armour, the loincloth at his waist. Naked, he bowed his head over the washbowl, seemed to draw breath out of the close air.  
He stood there for seconds. Minutes?  
"There is no water," he said finally, his voice hoarse.

As if on cue, the curtain was pushed open and the tiny woman with the wizened face bustled in, carrying the same yoke and buckets she'd brought for Relta. This time, though, she was silent. She could barely lift the pails, so Achilles took one and filled the bowl, pouring the rest of the water over his head. When he looked up again, his face was its normal colour; the mask of blood had, for the most part, been washed into the sand.

As he scrubbed his face, his chest, the old woman examined him, tutting loudly. She pressed his back, his wounds, and he yelped, pushing her hand away.  
"Queen," he said loudly. "You are skilled with the needle, are you not?"  
"Yes," Relta replied, a feeling of dread sinking down into her stomach.  
He turned his back to her and showed her a gash on his shoulder. She put a hand over her mouth to stop herself from vomiting.  
"You have sewn a wound before?" he asked.  
"No," she whispered.  
"Then this is the time to learn," Achilles replied. "I hope your stitches are as neat on my shoulder as they are on your robes."  
"Don't you think someone else – " she began.  
"Do it," he ordered and pulled over a small stool.  
He sank on to it and covered his face with his hands for a second.  
"Come," he said, snapping his fingers.

The old woman glared at her and she approached slowly, cautiously, as though the man before her was a wounded animal.  
Relta pulled out her pouch and selected a needle.  
"Clean the wound," she ordered the old woman.  
That she understood, Relta thought crossly as the other woman tenderly cleaned Achilles' wound.  
Then Relta took a deep breath and used her fingers to press the skin together and slowly stitched it shut. She finished with a shudder, feeling light-headed.  
The old woman pushed her aside and covered the wound with a herbal paste. Achilles snapped his fingers at her and she left the tent backwards, bowing as she left.

He stood up slowly and continued to wash, scratching the blood and dirt from his skin with a cloth.  
"We lost," he said shortly.  
"I am sorry to hear that," Relta replied, choosing her words carefully.  
"Are you?"  
"Of course."  
"I thought you would wish to see me dead," he said bitterly.  
She didn't reply at first, then said, "No, my lord."  
He glanced at her, then returned to his scrubbing.

When he was clean, he approached the bed, looking at her curiously.  
Relta braced herself.  
"Move over," Achilles ordered and she moved back, allowing him to pull back the covers and slide into the bed.  
"You have nothing to fear," he added grumpily. "I, for one, just want to sleep."  
She said nothing, watched his adjust the pillow to his liking. Then he turned and looked at her.  
"Well?"  
"Well what?"  
"Do you wish to sleep on the floor here, too?"  
His face had the ghost of a smile, a kind of resigned grimace.  
Relta smiled at him in return.

"I quite like the idea of a night in a real bed," she admitted.  
He pulled back the cover and indicated she should join him.  
"You can take off the robe," he suggested as she climbed in beside him.  
"No, thank you."  
"You might reconsider in the morning," he said, draping an arm over her waist.  
"No, thank you," she said again, removing the hand that had settled comfortably on her breast. "Your arm is too heavy. And you're too warm."  
"Remove the robe, then."  
"No, I won't. Stay on your own side of the bed. I don't like people touching me in my sleep."

He chuckled and rolled over, hissing through his teeth as the skin pulled at his wound.  
"We can discuss it in the morning," he said wearily.  
Relta rolled to the edge of the bed and despite her misgivings, her eyes began to droop within seconds. She registered the by-now familiar sound of Achilles' steady breathing before she fell fast asleep.

In the middle of the night she woke and found him curled around her back, his hand back in its usual position on her right breast. She tried to prise it away but he just murmured something in his sleep and pressed himself closer.

Relta was too tired to fight it and settled back to sleep, the Myrmidon's large hand planted firmly on her chest.  
Some battles really are best fought in daylight, she thought.


	14. 14

Achilles knew how to please women.

This he knew to be true; many women had told him so and he had no reason to believe they were lying.

And yet the White Queen moved beneath him, with her eyes fixed on a point behind his shoulder, while he nuzzled her neck and thrust inside. When he pulled her chin to make her look at him, her face split in a broad grin and she shrugged with mock indifference. He cursed her and she laughed, which sent shudders through her body and into his. He moved more quickly and watched the flush of colour move up her neck and across her face, then she bit her knuckles to swallow any sound. He came inside her, his forehead resting against hers, but she moved her face away, covering it with her hand.

He suddenly understood: she would not moan.  
She would not please him to make a sound.  
He rolled off her and pulled her hand away. She looked up at him mischievously.

"What?" she said in mock-innocence.  
"You are a witch," he said and he could not stop himself from laughing again. "A more contrary woman I have yet to meet."  
Relta gave him a gentle push.  
"You got what you wanted," she said. "And yet you still complain. Really, Achilles."  
He slid an arm under her neck and pulled her close, so her forehead rested against his chin.  
"What do you plan to do with me?" she asked.  
"Well," he answered teasingly, "if you let me rest for a few minutes, we could try – "  
"No," Relta answered, seriously. "No. What is to happen with me? You can't keep me stuck inside a tent for years, you know. You can't hide me till Agamemnon forgets about me – the man has a long memory and nurses a grudge like a child sucks its thumb."

Achilles stroked her hair, picking up a lock of it between his finger and thumb. He had never seen a colour like this before; not real hair. He'd known wealthy women who'd worn wigs made from the shorn heads of slaves taken in the far north, but he'd never seen hair of this bizarre copper colour on a woman. Unlike the hair of many of the Greek women he'd known, hers was very soft and fine. He tugged it gently and she swatted his hand away with a cross, "Ouch!"

"I don't know," he admitted. "I'll think of something."  
She rubbed her fingers along the scar on his shoulder and said softly, "You could let me go."  
"No," he snapped.  
"I will leave you eventually," she said.  
It wasn't a threat, but a statement of fact.  
They stared at each other; he looked down on her and expected her to avert her eyes but she didn't. She just regarded him with the same blue eyes as his own, a curiously expressionless look on her face.  
"I will decide when you leave," Achilles said finally.  
"As you wish, my lord," she replied tonelessly.  
He would have liked to feel that he had won some kind of victory but it didn't feel like it.

"I am going to go down to the sea," he said curtly and sat up.  
She rolled over into the slit of sunlight that came through the leather curtain and it illuminated her skin. It was easy to see why they called her the White Queen: next to the golden tan of his skin, she was like marble.  
Wordlessly she pulled up the bed cover and disappeared beneath it.

xXx

He saw Nestor approaching when he came out of the water and knew by the older man's rapid pace that he was not out for a pleasurable stroll but had business in mind. Achilles grabbed his robe and thumped Patroclus on the shoulder.  
"Waylay him," he said, nodding at Nestor. "I need to ... tidy up."  
Patroclus wrapped a cloth around his waist and headed up the beach towards Nestor, Achilles took the same route with rapid strides, ducking into the tent ahead of them.  
She was still in the bed, the cover kicked off, wrapped in a thin linen sheath.  
"Apologies, my lady," Achilles said.  
Her eyes shot open as he yanked the bed clothes and flipped her over the side and on to the floor. He heard a yelp as she fell out of sight.

"Good Achilles," Nestor said, by way of greeting.  
He rapped the door frame and pushed the curtain aside.  
"Nestor," he said clearly. "Has Agamemnon sent you or have you come by to break your fast with me?"  
He hoped the woman would understand what was happening and stay out of sight. He tried to glance around casually and saw a small foot pull back behind the bed.  
Nestor was still blinking in the gloom, trying to adjust his eyes to the darkness of the tent.  
"Well, both, if truth be told," he said pleasantly.  
"Get Ahma to bring some food," Achilles ordered his cousin. "Sit," he said to Nestor, nodding at the low bench against the wall.

Nestor lowered himself carefully on to the furs, looking around.  
Achilles sat at the edge of the bed and smiled at his visitor. He bore no ill-will towards Nestor; he was Agamemnon's man, to be sure, but his advice tempered some of Agamemnon's worse decisions. Achilles respected him as a general, which was more than could be said of his master.  
"Do you know," Nestor remarked conversationally, "the last time I was in here was just after we landed. And I do not believe that much has changed since then."  
"I don't have much of a knack for decoration," Achilles said.  
"Still, most of the men have made their tents a little bit more ... homely."  
"It feels homely to me."

Nestor smiled at him.  
"Perhaps it lacks a woman's touch," he said, raising an eyebrow.  
As if on cue, the curtain was pulled back and Ahma came in with a tray of fruit and olives, bread and cheese. Patroclus followed with a wine jug, which she pulled off him roughly, scolding him in her own language. She knelt to pour the wine, then Achilles said, "Leave us."  
She sniffed disdainfully and left.  
"What brings you here?" Achilles asked.  
He took an apple and split it with his knife, cutting it carefully so he wouldn't have to look at his visitor.  
"Agamemnon wants to strike again soon," Nestor said.  
"He would strike daily," replied Achilles dully. "Sisyphus spends eternity pushing his boulder up a hill but at least he has the good sense to realise it's futile."  
"Our king has a plan."  
"Hmm."  
"To scale the walls."  
"It cannot be done."  
"It cannot be done by an army," Nestor corrected. "But by a select few? It can be done. There is a Mycenaen warrior who can scale the masts of a ship like a monkey. The men bet to see how fast he can climb – he is like the wind, Achilles, you would not believe your eyes. He could easily scale that wall under the cover of night and lower a rope – lower a number of ropes. We would be on the ramparts in an hour and from there we would take the city."  
"It won't work," Achilles said curtly. "There are sentries."  
"The sentries are looking out for groups, for troops, for bands of invaders. Not one man. One single man."

Achilles thought about it.  
"It's foolhardy," he said.  
"It's daring," Nestor countered.  
"And you want me to climb up that wall after this monkey man?"  
"You are the best. You fear nothing, but all of Troy fears you."  
Achilles laughed drily.  
"Ah, you flatter me," he said.  
"This could be the beginning of the end of the Siege of Troy," Nestor said. "It is our most daring plan yet and King Agamemnon thinks that this will be the arrow that finally pierces Prince Hector's armour. When the gates of Troy are thrown open by the Greeks, I am certain you will want to be the one with his hand on the latch. For these are the men that history will remember, my friend, not the ones who push the open gate and take a city with its legs spread like a whore."

Achilles remembered what his mother had told him. His glory would be found in Troy. And so far the beaches had yielded nothing but battles scars and sandy wounds.

"I will think on it," he said finally. "And Agamemnon may think on what he would like to offer me to make me think on it more quickly."  
Nestor put his goblet on the ground and raised himself slowly, inelegantly.  
Achilles stood up with him, holding out an arm for him to grab and steady himself.  
"I heard a curious rumour going around camp," Nestor said, patting his forearm in thanks.  
"Oh?"  
"Some of the women on the sand-dunes yesterday were approached by a white woman, one pale as a ghost. She spoke with an accent."  
"Is that so?"  
"Her hair was covered, but they thought she was fair."  
"Many of the slaves are fair."  
Nestor looked around. Achilles took a small step to the side to block his view of the bed.  
"And the Ithacans say you were blessed by the weather from the moment your ships left the port of Kalios. They say it was as if the wind came from Apollo's very mouth."  
"We were fortunate, indeed."  
"It made me wonder whether there was more in your cargo than that crude Kalion gold and the stinking cheese they are so proud of."

Achilles grinned, rubbed his chin.  
The other king smiled back at him. Nestor was no fool and his ears were finely attuned to camp gossip, his finger on the pulse of the Greek soldiers' moods.  
"I took nothing but what Agamemnon gave me," he said, shrugging.  
Nestor looked him up and down.  
"Well," he said after a moment. "If you did this for him, there is little he would not grant you in reward. Not that any reward could come close to competing with the immortality a deed such as this would attain you."  
Achilles tut-tutted mockingly.  
"I will take the gods' immortality," he said, "But Agamemnon can think of something he would like to give me as well. Tell him I will think on it."

Nestor moved to the door and pulled the curtain aside.  
"You need a woman, Achilles," he said, looking around. "This place is a mess."  
He smiled at the blond man and nodded pointedly at the bed.  
Achilles glanced casually over his shoulder.  
The bed was, indeed a mess, and the two pillows still showed the dents of their heads. He cursed himself silently.  
"And if you don't mind my saying," Nestor continued, "it smells a little of ... wolf."  
He smiled at Achilles and left the tent, letting the curtain drop behind him.

Relta's head popped up from behind the bed.  
"Do you think he knows?" she whispered.  
"He knows," was the grim reply.


	15. 15

"I stand corrected," Achilles said.  
"High praise indeed," was Odysseus' dry reply.

They were standing in the sand in front of the Spartan boats. Agamemnon's man, the one they called the Monkey, was scaling the mast of the beached boat with the speed and ease of the animal they named him for. He was a small, wiry man and he moved quickly up the pole, hanging from one rope before swinging to another with effortless ease. Odysseus and Achilles watched him out of the corner of their eyes, pretending to be deep in conversation: Agamemnon had warned them that the camp was crawling with spies. They could look at his secret weapon but give no indication that they were looking. Otherwise, he feared, someone would put two and two together and that cursed Prince Hector would suddenly take it upon himself to double the patrols on the walls.

"So you think he can do it?" Achilles said, walking slowly away.  
The King of Ithaca kept pace.  
"Aye, I do," he said. "The wall to the north, just before the tower, has fallen into disrepair near the bottom. Enough to give the lad a few footholds, to help him on his way up. He'll carry the longest rope we have, secure it from the ramparts."  
"He doesn't look strong enough to carry a skein of thread, much less a coil of rope," Achilles said doubtfully.  
"Well, he'll have to, won't he?" Odysseus replied pragmatically.  
He steered Achilles towards Agamemnon's ship, the one the King of Kings had had covered in canvas and tapestries to create the finest residence on the beach. Achilles tried to pull away, but Odysseus kept his elbow in his firm grip.  
"Oh no you don't," he said grimly. "And keep that tongue of yours under control, my friend."  
Achilles grinned at him.

xXx

"Well then, man, what say you?" Agamemnon roared.  
The king and his brother could not speak at a normal volume. Everything they said was shouted or bellowed in their loud, booming voices.  
Nestor cleared his throat quietly and raised an eyebrow at the king in a vain attempt to remind him to keep his voice down.  
"He thinks it has a chance of success," Odysseus supplied before Achilles could answer.  
"See? See?" Agamemnon crowed, turning to his brother. "I told you so!"  
Menelaus grunted.  
"It's a foolhardy venture," he said.  
"And what if it is? If that Monkey falls to his death – what of it? Just one man. If they kill him – what of it? Just one man. But if he succeeds, if he gets on the ramparts and secures that rope – well, that will be Priam's undoing."  
Agamemnon rubbed his hands with glee.  
"And you will be among the first, brave Achilles!" he cried, ebullient with good humour, the previous day's run-in on the beach disregarded and their latest defeat in war already forgotten.

Achilles rubbed his chin thoughtfully.  
"We will have to do it tonight or tomorrow," he said. "The moon has waned and it's at its darkest. But even still, the chances are high that the guards on the ramparts will spot us as we climb."  
"You will have to wear black," Odysseus said. "Cover your hair with dark cloth, blacken your face with soot. You will need to be like ghosts, like the dogs of Hades."  
He smiled at the Myrmidon, who was pacing thoughtfully on Agamemnon's fine carpet, rubbing the stubble on his face, his forehead wrinkled in thought. "Who will you take with you? Ajax?"  
"No, he is not nimble enough," Achilles replied thoughtfully.  
"He will not like that!" Menelaus interjected, but Achilles ignored him.  
"Timon – he can scale a wall. Eudorus. Patroclus."  
"Patroclus?" Odysseus said."  
"It has not been long since he was climbing trees," Achilles grinned. "And he would not forgive me if I left him out of this adventure. That's all. No more."  
"But – " Agamemnon began.  
"The fewer, the better," interrupted Odysseus. "I think we all agree that the element of surprise is what will win us this battle."  
"Then let us put this fine plan into action!" Agamemnon shouted. "Tomorrow night!"

Nestor cleared his throat again and nodded at the door of the tent to remind his lord that, on the beaches of Troy, someone was always listening.  
Agamemnon nodded, rubbed his hands in glee.  
"Open the gates of Troy for me, Myrmidon, and you will have eternal fame. They will sing ballads about us for a thousand years!" Agamemnon cried.  
Achilles smiled coolly and opened his mouth to make a retort.  
"Indeed they will, King of Kings," Odysseus said and pinched his friend's elbow again, pulling him with him out of the tent.

xXx

"So what have you done with her?"  
"Who?" Achilles asked distractedly. His mind was already rattling through the plan, thinking out his strategy. Odysseus would have faced the prospect with resignation but Achilles seemed to relish the thrill.  
"The she-wolf."  
They were walking towards Achilles' tent. Their men called to them in greeting as they passed. Achilles turned to him, a broad grin across his face.  
"What have I done with her? Wouldn't you love to know all the things I have done with her!"  
He laughed his husky laugh, a sound Odysseus hadn't heard for some time.  
"And where is she now?"  
"In my tent," Achilles said, surprised. "Where else would she be? She's waiting for me to return."  
"Have you tied her up?" asked Odysseus, suddenly uneasy.

Achilles looked at him and a frown crossed his face. He began to walk faster with Odysseus hurrying behind. He got to the tent and pulled open the curtain roughly.  
"Relta," he said in a low voice. "Relta."  
Odysseus' eyes took a moment or two to adjust but he didn't even need that long to realise that the tent was empty.  
Achilles stormed out.  
"Quiet, my friend," Odysseus said. "Do not shout her name – no one can know she's here."  
"Fetch Ahma," he snarled at Eudorus, who appeared at his side.  
The man bowed and hurried off.  
"You need to keep her ... restrained," Odysseus said. "You can't keep a wolf in your tent and expect it not to wander off."  
"She was ..."  
Achilles paused, his eyes scanning the horizon. "She was content with me," he finished awkwardly. "I'm sure she wouldn't run, she is smart enough to know it is pointless."  
Odysseus turned away to roll his eyes and saw Eudorus return, with the little Abyssinian woman close behind. Achilles grabbed her and pulled her into tent, followed by Odysseus and, after a moment's hesitation, Eudorus.

"Where is she?" Achilles said. "My woman – the white queen? Where is she?"  
Ahma looked around, perplexed, and shrugged.  
"When did you see her last?" he growled.  
She said something in her own language and mimicked eating – she'd eaten, then Ahma had gone to the well for water.  
"Where did she go?"  
He grabbed the small woman by her robe and shook her fiercely.  
"Achilles," Odysseus said placatingly, trying to wrest his hand away.  
"Where did she go?"  
"She doesn't know, my lord," Eudorus pleaded. "Let her go."  
Achilles shoved him roughly aside with his free hand. The little woman's teeth were rattling in her head, her master's face almost pressed against hers.

"Stop it!"  
There was a flash of black and a small figure in a dark robe darted into the tent.  
The she-wolf.  
She pushed Odysseus so she could throw herself between Achilles and his servant, then started to whack Achilles' arms, digging her nails into his hands till he released his grip on Ahma.  
"You bully," she said furiously, her face red with temper. "You bully!"  
"Where were you?"  
"I went outside and I – "  
"You must not – you may not leave this tent," he thundered. Eudorus and Odysseus hushed him in chorus.  
"I can't stay cooped up in here all day," she said.

She looked from one man to the next, her face defiant.  
Her hair was bound under a white linen cloth and her face was grubby. She had probably been out among the servants, Odysseus thought. The gods only knew who she had spoken to or who had seen her.  
"King Nestor already suspects you are here," Achilles said roughly. "Do you want to walk straight up to him and throw yourself at his feet?"  
The white queen looked at him and gritted her teeth. She said nothing in reply.

"There's nothing more to say now. All's well that ends well," Odysseus said calmly. "But you can't go wandering about, your majesty. This is no place for you to take a stroll."  
Achilles tugged the cloth off her head; she glared at him when he touched her.  
"We'll leave you now," Odysseus continued. "Come, Eudorus."  
Achilles nodded his leave and jerked his head at the door of the tent to indicate that Ahma should leave, too. She did, complaining bitterly.

When Odysseus said goodbye to Eudorus, he stopped briefly to listen: there was the sound of a hushed argument inside, Achilles' deep voice and the rapid hiss of the woman's replies. He sighed and made his way slowly across the beach. His friend was not one to lose his focus because of a pretty girl, but already the queen was distracting him. Odysseus stomped through the sand, wishing for the umpteenth time that he had just set her free on the docks of Kalios.

xXx

Paris stopped at every group of guards, asked after their wives and children, joked with the ones he had trained with. He always felt more at ease with the archers: he knew they admired his skill with the bow, his unerring aim and steady hand. The foot soldiers were wont to compare him with his older brother and find him lacking: Hector had always been bigger, stronger, more skilled with the sword. Hector had been a fearless boy, a courageous youth and he was a brave man. Paris had been a sickly boy, spoiled by Queen Hecuba. She had hated the sight of him swinging a sword: she winced every time his older brother took a step towards him, thrusting the wooden weapon at the child in practice. She was the one who had encouraged him to take up the bow and arrow as his weapon of choice, even though Priam had said that the bow was a cowardly weapon and not the choice of kings.

But what did it matter? Hecuba had said. Paris was not destined to be king, so why shouldn't he have the opportunity to master the weapon of his liking?  
And King Priam had conceded, as he did in so many things when it came to his wife and his pretty young son.

Now Paris was the most skilled archer of all the Trojans but his skill would never be as valued as his brother's talent with the sword. The only place it was appreciated was on the ramparts and, late at night, when he could not sleep because of the twisting sick feeling that tied his stomach in knots, he slipped out of his bed and padded through the palace, down the streets of the city to the walls and inspected the Trojan defences, feeling welcome among his troops, his archers. Some nights he just stood silently on the high walls, watching the orange flickers of campside fires dotted along the beaches.

Agamemnon's troops had made themselves at home. They were trading with those villagers that had returned to their homes – after all, no one had expected the siege to last months and certainly not years. King Priam wanted to have them rounded up and beheaded for treason but level-headed Hector stopped him: they would find out what the Greeks were planning. The Trojan villagers would surely be loyal to their king, the prince argued.

And Hector, as usual, was right: they knew when there was unrest in camp; they knew when Agamemnon fought with his brother. They had learned when the Myrmidons left and Hector had mounted a brave sortie against the Greeks, cutting down hundreds of their men. Paris had watched his brother ride into battle from the city walls, sick with fear and jealously when he saw his brother relentlessly mow down the enemy.

"Hail, Prince Paris!" said one of the men.  
They stood aside respectfully.  
"A quiet night," Paris said.  
"Indeed, my lord," the man said.  
And glanced at his comrades.  
Paris knew something was afoot.  
"Is there something you wish to tell me?" he asked.  
The man who had spoken looked at the others again.  
"It's just that ... it's just that my brother lives in the village by the stream, my lord. He has been trading grain with the Greeks – he says he must do it to feed his family, my lord, and they threaten to kill him if he does not – "  
"It's all right," Paris said gently. "Many of our people are forced to trade with the Greeks. We cannot condemn them for that. What did your brother say?"  
"He says ... well, he was delivering a load of grain and he saw something curious. They were blackening a rope, my lord."  
Paris looked at him, not understanding.  
"He said they had a length of rope and they were rubbing it with ash and soot from the fire to darken it," the man said again. "Why would they do such a thing, we were asking ourselves."

The man stared at Paris, willing him to understand.  
"They need a black rope so it will not be seen," Paris said slowly. "In the darkness."  
The men nodded.  
"Aye," one said. "They plan to scale the walls at night."  
"We weren't sure if we should say anything," the first man said. "Perhaps Prince Hector will think we're just making a fuss about nothing. After all, no amount of rope will help them scale the walls of Troy, am I right?"  
The men murmured agreement.  
Paris thought quickly, biting his lower lip.  
"Should we tell Prince Hector, my lord?" another man asked anxiously.  
"No," he said. "No, we shall not. We shall be extra vigilant, watch the wall like hawks. If we see any Greeks on the walls, we shall pluck them off with our arrows like apples from a tree."  
The men nodded.  
"If they plan to scale the walls – and that's a very uncertain prospect – we will defend them, as this is our task. We don't need Hector's soldiers in our way."  
The men laughed and gave a low cheer. Paris felt buoyant, hopeful that the Greeks would mount an attack. They would no doubt try their luck before the moon started to swell again and he, Paris, would be waiting on them.

What a fine tale of bravery: a cunning attack on the walls of Troy, thwarted by Paris!  
He said goodnight to the men and walked off, on his way to the next post to tell the men what he had learned. He would be back on the ramparts at dusk tomorrow, his quiver full of arrows, ready for battle.  
He could barely wait.


	16. 16

_Reading along? Leave a comment and say hello!_

Relta didn't know Achilles very well but she had learned to be more wary of him when he was seething in quiet rage than when he was yelling. She had seen it on board the boat, the controlled anger that made him clench his fists and turn away deliberately; a concerted effort not spill blood or snap bones.  
The gods had made the man a killer, she'd realised, so his biggest challenge was not to kill, but to not kill. He could twist her neck like a little bird's, shake her senseless, crack her skull with a hard smack. But he was standing before her, his face twisted with rage, exercising his very deliberate, quiet control.  
It was terrifying.

He inhaled, looked her up and down with his eyes narrowed and his knuckles white.  
"Where were you?" he asked, his voice low.  
"I can't stay in here all day," she hissed at him. "I can't – "  
"Where were you?"  
"I had to – " she stopped and glared at him. "I had to ... relieve myself."  
She feigned discomfort, watching him out of the corner of her eye. Achilles opened his mouth to say something and stopped. Then tried again.  
"There is a bucket – Ahma could – you don't have to – " he tried.  
"I'm not going to shit in a bucket with that old woman watching me," Relta snapped. "I can go over the dune to the latrine like the other women. No one paid any attention to me."  
"You just went over the – " he stopped, uncomfortable.

Relta suppressed a smirk. Like most Greek men she had known, his interest in the inner workings of the female body was restricted to the bits that involved him.  
"Yes," she said. "And then down to the sea to wash."  
He jumped on that.  
"Don't go down to the shore!" he ordered. "You will wash in here. Ahma has been instructed to help you."  
Relta shrugged. "Fine, my lord," she replied with heavy sarcasm.

Achilles nodded and pulled off his robe. He turned his back to her and said, "Check the wound."  
"Please," she snapped.  
"What?"  
"Check the wound, _please_ ," she said, not disguising her irritation. "I'm not your servant."  
She clicked her fingers and indicated that he should step closer.  
"Don't try me, witch."

She seethed, tugged at his arm so he'd bend down a little to let her examine the wound, then carefully pulled off the covering and gasped. It had practically healed, the skin was a healthy pink and the cut had closed.  
"What's wrong?" he asked, turning his head.  
"I've never seen anything like this," she said. "It's better. By tomorrow it will be ... completely healed."  
"I heal quickly," Achilles replied dismissively.  
She ran a finger over the wound. His skin was smooth and, against her pale fingers, the colour of honey. She hesitated.  
"In Kalios they said you were sired of the gods," Relta said carefully.  
Achilles ducked his head so his blond hair fell forward and covered his face. She could not see his expression, could not guess what he was thinking.  
"Did they?" he muttered.  
"Is it true?" she asked.  
"What do you think?"  
She considered the question, tracing the line of his backbone down the centre of his back. Then she splayed her fingers out, like a star, a lay them against his warm skin. He shivered; she felt a tiny ripple beneath her touch.  
"You are different," she said finally, slowly.  
"I _am_ different," he agreed.

Achilles stood upright and turned to face her. "In a couple of days, Agamemnon will be so beholden to me, he will grant me any favour I ask. And I will ask for you."  
Relta felt her blood run cold.  
"What will you do?" she asked. She felt a sense of dread, a forewarning, but she couldn't explain why.  
"We shall scale the walls," Achilles replied with a grin. "Like monkeys."  
She opened her mouth to ask a question but he turned from her and pulled his robe off, to lie down, naked, on the bed.  
"Come here," he said, "I'll tell you everything."  
She hesitated again, unnerved by the feeling that had sunk between the blades of her shoulders, but his blue eyes were full of mirth and his large hand was patting the bed, oblivious to her unease.  
"Come on, queen," he said. "Come to my bed, where you belong."  
She smiled at him and pulled her robe off. She knew she could distract him enough to make him forget why he'd been angry with her in the first place.

Because as soon as he had forgotten it, she would take off like an arrow from a bow, out of his tent, again.

xXx

Relta hadn't been honest with him.  
Not entirely.

She had waited in the hot, dark tent for what seemed an interminable time, waiting, waiting for Achilles to return. He'd left the tent after Nestor's departure without telling her where he was going; after some time, Ahma came by with water and food. Relta was roughly scrubbed again and her hair combed out, then - and only then – was she given something to eat. She had complained bitterly but the little woman didn't understand.  
Or she simply pretended not to understand, chattering at her in her own language.

"You're grooming me like his prize horse," Relta grumbled under her breath. "Braiding my hair and polishing my hooves."  
Ahma cackled.  
"You stay here, wait Achilles," she said, ignoring Relta's bristling tone. "No leave tent. No outside. No, no, no."  
She gathered up the platters and left, wagging a finger as she did.  
"Good girl, stay," she said.

The curtain had barely fallen shut before Relta was on her feet, rifling through the linen cloths, trying to find one to bind back her hair.

She'd followed some women to the area the slaves were using as a latrine, then she had gone down to the sea - that much was true. After that she'd picked up the urn outside Achilles' door and she'd heaved it onto her shoulder to obscure her face, then she'd started down the beach with a purposeful walk. People who walked purposefully were rarely stopped, she knew: a purposeful walk meant you had somewhere to go. That you belonged, you knew where you were going.

In actual fact, she had no idea where she was going.  
She got as far as the dunes where people had gathered to watch the battle, then she kept going, pausing to shield her eyes from the sun and guess at the distance to the nearest villages. She racked her brain, trying to remember what she knew of Troy and realised with a sinking heart that heading inland would only lead her further east. Upon that realisation she turned around and looked out over the beach of Troy and at the deep blue sea beyond it, feeling nothing but despair. Her only hope was to board a boat going west: first to Greece, then on from there to Malta or Carthage.

 _How would I do that?_ she wondered.  
Any of the Greek ships that left simply went on raiding parties, the men on the boat had told her, and returned within weeks with their spoils. To the warriors' chagrin, no one had been allowed to return home, not even to gather supplies. Agamemnon had kept them all on a tight leash, camped out at Troy's feet. If the damned Achaeans ever won their stupid, pointless war, they would all return to their homeland and she could go, too. She had only a vague idea of where Phtia was, but she had already traversed most of Greece so she was certain she would get to somewhere on the western shore easily enough.

A passing man grabbed her shoulder roughly.  
"Myrmidons stay down their own end of the beach," he growled.  
"Yes," she whispered, her head down, "Yes, my lord. I got lost."

She hurried on before he could say any more.  
She passed a tent she'd seen the previous day, where a mother still sat in the doorway, her children playing outside. She nodded in recognition as Relta walked by. She smiled automatically in return but even as she did so, she wondered how long that woman had been on the Trojan beach. The children were no longer infants – they were two, three years old? They'd been on the cursed beach for years, so by that reckoning, Relta might also have to wait for years before Agamemnon finally ground King Priam to defeat.  
"Danu, Danu," she prayed to the mother goddess, "I need to find a way off this beach."

"My lady?"  
Her head whipped up. Timon was standing in front of her, his face appalled.  
"My lady," he whispered, "does Achilles know you are wandering about?"  
She ventured a grin at him, hoping to make light of it.  
"No," she whispered back and placed a finger over her lips. "It's a secret."  
Timon's narrow face was furrowed in a frown.  
"You are wearing his robe," he said, plucking it with his calloused fingers. "Every man in the camp recognises the colour and I'm sure every woman will recognise the stitching. You should not be out and you certainly should not be out in this. He doesn't want anyone to know he has a new slave."  
_Slave._ The distasteful word burned in her ears but she ignored it, an effort of will.  
"Please don't tell him," she said, batting her eyelashes. "Please, Timon. He'll be so angry. You know what he's like when he's angry."

Timon paused.  
"Very well, my lady, but you must return straight away and you can't take off by yourself. It's no place for a queen. This camp is full of men who would not hesitate to take you aside and ..."  
He stopped and pointed in the direction of Achilles' tent.  
"Just go back," he finished weakly. "Go back before he misses you."  
She handed him the urn and hurried off, picking up her pace when she saw Achilles' blond head disappear into the tent, followed by the king of Ithaca and Eudorus.  
"Curse the man," she thought, pulling up his robe around her ankles so she could sprint across the sand. She braced herself to face Achilles' wrath.

xXx

Paris could not tell Helen. She would worry and fret; she might even tell Hector to prevent Paris from carrying out the plan on his own.  
_No,_ he thought, _this would be his own victory. His alone._

When dusk fell, he hurried to the city walls, his quiver groaning with the weight of his arrows. He made his way up to the ramparts, nodding at the guards that were leaving and greeting the guards that had come for the night's watch. The guards of the night's watch were given their orders: they had to keep their eyes peeled, trained on the walls at all time. Paris made sure their line of communication was open: if someone saw something, they had to take their position immediately but make sure the word was passed along swiftly so the second tier of archers could rush into position as quickly as possible. The bow slung over his shoulder, he looked around to make sure no one was looking, then rubbed his hands with glee.

He walked along the ramparts, where the archers were standing on alert.  
"How goes it?" he said, recognising the man he'd spoken to the previous night. "It's Iason, isn't it?"  
"Aye, my lord prince," the man said proudly. "All is quiet here. We will be vigilant, rest assured. No Trojan will even manage to approach the walls when we are on guard."  
"Good, good," Paris said. "If those rumours are true, we will be the ones who prevent those Achaean sons of whores from climbing our walls."  
He tapped his chest with the tip of his bow.  
A small cheer rang out from the men within earshot.  
"Now all we must do is wait," said Paris decisively. "We will let them come to us and slaughter them like lambs."  
He grinned at the men and held his bow aloft.  
"Be ready!" he said and, once again, they cheered.  
He strode off to take up his position on the wall and to wait.

And there he waited.  
And waited.  
And waited, till the dawn's light crept up the sky and he heard the footsteps of the day watch on the ramparts.  
_The Greeks aren't coming,_ he realised.  
He set down his bow and peered at their encampment, saw the smoke of the first morning fires rising.  
They weren't coming, the dogs.  
Paris felt deflated.

Iason stopped for a moment as the archers filed past to let their cohorts take up their positions.  
"Tomorrow night, my lord prince," he whispered. "Before the moon starts to swell again, they will attack, I am sure of it."  
Paris nodded, too disappointed to say a word.  
"Get some rest, Prince Paris," the older man said, patting his arm. "You will need all your strength for tomorrow night."  
Paris nodded again.  
"You're right," he smiled and let the archers file down, before greeting the day watch and leaving the walls.

He wearily made his way up through the city streets, nodding and smiling at the Trojans up and about their business at dawn. The palace was only stirring when he arrived and he slipped up some side steps and through a gate that led to the gardens. Glancing up at his bedchamber, he saw the curtains were still drawn; that meant Helen was asleep. He could slip in beside her warm body and no one would be any the wiser. That much, at least, was a relief.

"Paris," Hector said, stepping out of the shadows.  
_Damn, damn, damn,_ Paris thought, but he turned to his brother with an easy smile.  
"Good morning!" he called.  
"Where have you been?" Hector asked.  
"I couldn't sleep," Paris replied. "I had to stretch my legs. Beautiful morning."  
Hector approached him, his arm outstretched and tapped the strap of his quiver.  
"A walk?" he said incredulously. "Fully armed?"  
Paris swallowed and stared at his brother. Hector looked down at him, his arms folded across his chest: his was a gentle face but when he wanted to, his brown eyes could be stern. The look on his face at that moment made Paris feel very young.  
"You know something that I should know," Hector concluded. He put an arm around his little brother's shoulders. "I think you should come inside and tell me all."  
Paris bit back the desire to curse out loud and allowed himself to be led through the stone columns to Hector's chambers.


	17. 17

Paris was despondent.  
Helen reached out to stroke his arm. She was barely awake; it had taken her a few minutes to figure out the source of his dejection but when she did, she sat upright in bed, horrified.  
"The Achaeans are planning to scale the walls?" she'd cried and Paris had quietened her.  
"As far as we know, it's just a few. I was planning to be waiting for them at the top," he said in a hushed tone. "I could have picked them off as they came up the rope."  
"You know who they would send," she'd said, scrunching the cover up in her fist. "They would send... _him_. That man."

Achilles.  
She couldn't bring herself to say his name. The spectre of Achilles loomed over Troy, like a storm on the horizon, like a coming death.  
They said he was of the gods, tarnished by their immortality. That he could not be killed. Lysander himself had met him in battle and managed to slash his arm before one of his loyal men had thrown himself between them and taken a blow to the heart meant for the Trojan captain of the guard. Lysander had managed to escape, badly injured, and had spent nearly a month laid low with his wounds.

Achilles had returned to the battlefield the next day, his gash a livid pink scar, almost healed.  
_He is not mortal,_ the women on the rampart had whispered, _this is not normal!_  
And Hector's wife, Andromache, had looked over at Helen with that wild look, that look of bleak despair etched into her beautiful face. For they all knew that Achilles was working his way towards the gates of Troy and he would mow down Hector to open them.

"I would send an arrow clean through Achilles' eye before he got near the top of our walls," Paris said firmly.  
It was not a boast: he stared at Helen resolutely.  
"But, my love," she said, picking her words carefully, "What would happen if you did not ... did not succeed? That monster would enter the city and all would be lost."  
"No one believes in me!" Paris cried. "Not even the woman who says she loves me! Even you take Hector's side!"  
Helen kissed the side of his face, her heart thumping.  
"Dearest," she whispered. "You mean everything to me. If I lost you, I would throw myself from these walls. I would do anything to keep you safe and if that means that Hector and his army stand behind you on that wall while you shoot at Achilles, then I beg you – I implore you – to do that. For me, my love. Not for Hector, not for you, but for me. Please, dear heart. Please."  
Paris kissed her mouth.  
"You need not worry, my love," he said softly. "I know what I am doing."  
"But I will worry," she insisted. "Please let Hector stand with you on the walls. Do it for me. _Please_."  
Paris looked at her and slowly nodded.  
"Very well," he said, subdued.

He gently pushed her over, smiling as he did so.  
"And if I am to fight tonight, I will need to rest now," he said, nuzzling her hair. "Will you stay with me, my sweet?"  
"No, Paris," Helen said, her heart sinking. "You should sleep. You will have to be in your best and fittest fighting form for tonight, after all."  
She smiled at him, trying to sound light-hearted, and he grinned back at her in return.  
He lay his dark head on the pillow, his eyes tired. Helen stroked his hair and watched him fall asleep.

xXx

"He will fight?" Hector asked. "And he will let me fight alongside him?"  
"He will," she answered simply.  
He was waiting outside their bedchamber, straight-backed and statue-still in a dark-blue robe.  
Helen fought back the desire to flee, which she always felt when she met her lover's brother. She'd often asked herself what fuelled this impulse to run whenever Hector looked her direction and she'd finally come to the realisation that it was shame. In his presence and, to a lesser extent in Andromache's, she felt ashamed for the blight she had visited upon their city, their kingdom. Hector, for his part, was careful to make as little eye contact with her as possible. Certainly, he played the part of attentive prince and caring brother-in-law, but he assiduously avoided being alone with her, never looked at her except when he addressed her directly – and even then, he was quick to glance away – and rarely initiated any conversation with her.

Why?, she'd wondered.  
_Because he hates me,_ was her bleak realisation. _He blames me for everything. And with good reason. But he is too noble, too well-bred – and he loves his brother too much – to allow himself to show it, except in the minutest of ways._  
She knew them well: the infinitesimal pause before he spoke to her, the reining in of his hatred behind his carefully-chosen words and his congenial smile.  
He was watching her now with that guarded look on his face, his brown eyes mirthless despite the polite smile on his face.  
"Thank you," he said, looking over her shoulder. "I am in no doubt that you persuaded him."  
"At Troy's service," Helen replied, the words ashen in her mouth.  
"I wish you a pleasant day, my lady," he said and bowed his head.  
She looked at his dark curls, his hair plaited back and held by small gold rings, the same colour as his brother's. When he raised his head again, he would not meet her eyes, just tugged on his chiton and walked away.

A sense of deep misery burned in her stomach and her appetite for breakfast was gone. She pulled her shawl around her shoulders, suddenly chilled, and decided to take a walk in the rose garden instead.

xXx

Andromache found her there. She saw Helen, handed her little boy to the nursemaid, and hurried to meet her among the red roses.  
"Hector told me," she whispered. "Those cunning knaves cannot win a fair battle, so they will resort to trickery and deceit. I hope Apollo strikes them dead and lets them rot."  
Her high cheekbones were pink with emotion.  
Helen gave her a watery smile.  
"Our men will keep them at bay," she replied. "It's a foolish plan, I can't imagine why the Greeks ever thought it would succeed. They're probably growing desperate."  
"Do you think?" Andromache said, jumping on the word. "Desperate enough to finally give up?"  
_Not if I know my husband_ , Helen thought miserably. _Menelaus would rather die trying than give up._  
"Quite possibly," she said to Hector's wife and watched in relief as Andromache's shoulders relaxed, a smile spreading across her face.  
"Oh, Helen," she said. "I do hope so!"

Helen felt an overwhelming desire to hug the other woman. Andromache was much taller than she and was taken aback by the spontaneous gesture, bending to meet her embrace. She patted Helen's blond head and said,  
"Why this, sister?"  
_Sister_. Helen could have wept.  
"You are too good, Andromache," she said, bitterly honest. "I do not deserve to be your sister."

Andromache slung an arm around her shoulder.  
"Hush now," she said. "Our brave men will protect the walls, wait and see."  
"Paris talks of shooting an arrow through Achilles' eye," Helen said, smothering a laugh. "I think he imagines that demon will just pop his head over the ramparts, so he can take a shot at him like a bird."  
Andromache chuckled.  
"Well, that would be one way to dispatch him to the underworld," she said. Then she paused and said, "Achilles is Agamemnon's man. Have you ever ... did you ever meet him?"  
Did you ever meet him in your other life, when he served your brother-in-law?  
"Yes," Helen confessed. "He was present at many banquets."  
"What is he like?"

Helen tried to put it in words: how did one describe Achilles?  
"He is ... unpleasant," she ventured, finally.  
The first time she'd seen him was shortly after their marriage, at a harvest banquet. Achilles strode in, with his golden skin, his golden hair, his golden armour, his muscles taut and strong, an arrogant sneer on his handsome face. Next to him, Menelaus tried to pull in his paunch and Agamemnon stood taller, swamped in his costly robes, but still cutting an insignificant figure next to the tall Myrmidon. She had been introduced to him and had found herself the subject of his assessing gaze. She'd kept her eyes on the floor, but when she dared to look up, he'd raised an eyebrow and looked away, bored.  
She'd been dismissed.

That was the last time he'd cast a glance in her direction.  
That night, the men had drunk deeply and Achilles had left with two women, including one of her handmaidens, a young Spartan woman that her husband had given her on her marriage. The girl's hair had been tugged loose and cascaded over her shoulders, her hands ran up and down Achilles' broad arms and chest. She looked bewitched, as though she could not bear not to touch his skin. He tousled her hair like a dog's, pushed her aside so he could stand up. Lia, her maid, threw herself at him again, her hands stroking his skin.  
She did not look in Helen's direction; no one in the room existed for the girl but Achilles.

When Achilles stood up, the two women at his side hurried after him. Helen raised her hand and opened her mouth to call after Lia, but Menelaus shoved her hand back down.  
"Achilles wants her," he said gruffly.  
"He can't have her," Helen pouted. "She's my handmaiden."  
Menelaus laughed uproariously.  
"He can have whoever he likes," he said. "That cur! The women swarm around him like bees."  
"Well, he cannot have me," she replied firmly. "He unnerves me."  
Menelaus planted a rough kiss on her forehead. "Of course he cannot have you. He does not deserve a pearl like you. And I'm not surprised he unnerves you, my little queen. The man is a killer. He is a dog sent to rip flesh from bones."  
"Will he ... will he hurt her?" she asked fearfully nodding at the doorway. In the shadows she saw the warrior bend to kiss one woman, his hand firmly planted on the bottom of the other.  
But Menelaus didn't reply, turning instead to answer his brother.

But Achilles didn't hurt the girl.  
On the contrary, she sneaked back into Helen's bedchambers and told the other handmaidens in hurried whispers about her night with the golden warrior. Flushed with love, the girl had spent the entire day mooning about, waiting for a summons, but that evening Achilles simply chose another woman, the buxom wife of one of Menelaus' generals, to romance. Lia had been devastated and Helen had had to listen to her weep for weeks. She'd prayed to the gods that the girl wouldn't become pregnant: the last thing she needed was a little blond Myrmidon bastard running around the Spartan kitchens, but the Myrmidons departed Sparta leaving only empty wine cellars and broken hearts.

"Well, do you know what?" Andromache whispered. "I will pray to the gods that Paris' arrow will go through his eye. I will burn the sacred herbs and pray that Apollo will guide his bow and send that cur tumbling to his death."  
Helen smiled.  
"Menelaus used to call him a cur," she said. "He said he was a dog of war."  
Andromache raised a hand to call the nursemaid over.  
"In this matter," the princess of Troy said, taking her son, "I am sorry to admit that Menelaus and I must agree."


	18. 18

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Because we all need a bit of distraction today, there is a two-chapter update. Start with the previous chapter, please ;-)

"Cousin?" Patroclus said, his voice hesitant.  
Achilles didn't look around. He patted the rock beside him and Patroclus sank down.  
"Is everything all right?" he asked tentatively.  
"Fine," Achilles said brusquely. "I'm just thinking about tonight."

It was a lie.  
He was looking out over the horizon, thinking about the woman in his tent, his stomach sour.  
They had lain together; she had seemed abject, downcast, and he thought he had finally brought her to her senses. She had made a special effort to please him, even though she still refused to moan in pleasure – but the sight of her biting her fist to prevent any sound always made him laugh and she grinned at him, stroking his face with her soft hand. Their lovemaking had been, as usual, satisfying, and afterwards they stretched out on his bed, nose to nose and fingers entwined.

"Tell me about your husband," he'd whispered and she'd frozen momentarily, as though turned to stone, her eyes watchful.  
"What do you want to know?" she asked.  
"How did you end up married to the King of Kalios?"  
She'd smiled a kind of half-smile, a grin of resignation, and started to tell him about how she'd come to court and her strange first encounters with the cranky Kalions, who'd mocked her odd accent and her freakish skin. Her impersonations were so funny, so accurate, that they laughed till tears rolled down their cheeks, hushing each other to stay quiet. She asked him about Agamemnon, then about the other kings ... till at some point he realised that he'd been doing all the talking and the subject of her marriage to the vain Kalion king had been touched upon... but never really answered.

Just as he realised this, she'd yawned and closed her eyes, murmuring that she needed to rest.  
So Achilles got up to wash, to call Ahma for food, and as he did, his eye caught sight of that pouch she had carried with her all the way from Kalios and a strange feeling came over him, an inkling of disquiet. A corner was sticking out from under the bed, so he bent down and pulled it out, throwing it open on the covers. Her eyes shot open when she heard the jangle of the metal buckle and she snatched at the strap to pull it away.

"No," he said, pushing her hand back.  
"That's mine," she snapped.  
"I know," he answered simply and upended its contents on the bed.  
There was a pouch of gold, some odd carved stones, a chiton rolled up tightly and a bright yellow piece of cloth which, when he shook it open, turned out to be a little dress. He pulled at the material in his hands, stretching it.  
She gasped.  
"Leave that alone!" she cried and tried to snatch it back.  
He held it over his head with one hand and with the other, pushed her back on to the bed. Then he pushed back the flap of the pouch and discovered that a map had been inked on the pale leather inside, a map of the coast of Greece, its main cities and islands, Crete, Syracuse, Cathage and the tribes around the Great Sea, up to Tartessus, up the ragged coastline of Hispania, north, ever northwards to the little islands scratched into the top lefthand corner. One of them bore a cross, a mark that seemed to radiate a determination from its dark ink.

He held it up wordlessly.  
Relta stared at him and, for the first time, he thought he saw real fear in her eyes, an unmitigated fear, not masked by one of her cheeky smiles or batting eyelashes.  
"You said you would leave me eventually," he said. "I see you already have your escape route planned."  
She said nothing.  
"So this is why you tried to run away today?"  
"I wasn't trying to run away."  
"Don't lie," he hissed. "I am not in the mood, woman."  
She licked her lips nervously.  
"I have a daughter," she said finally. "A small daughter. She's been sent on ahead. We're going back, back home to my people. I have to get out of here. My lord," she added, placatingly.

Achilles felt the material in his hands and looked down at the gaudy yellow, felt a compulsion to rend it in two.  
He pulled the material and heard her gasp again.  
"Please," she said. "It's all I have of her."  
Her eyes reddened and she blinked fiercely, trying not to cry.  
When he flung it at her, he noticed her discreetly raise the heel of her hand to her face to wipe a tear away, ducking her head so he would not see it as she folded the little dress, carefully and tenderly.

"And I thought you were ... happy with me," he said, unable to keep an ice out of his voice. "I told you that we could be together in a couple of days – Agamemnon wouldn't be able to harm you, and you would officially be my concubine. By the Gods, you would probably have far more status and far more jewels than you ever had as the Queen of Kalios."  
She said nothing.  
"You were not happy?" he insisted.  
It was an absurd question.  
Why did he care? He felt foolish as he asked it but he had to know. He thought they'd been happy, the hours spent laughing till his stomach hurt, her legs wrapped around his, one of her braids between his fingers. He'd simply taken for granted that she would take her place at his side to alleviate the dullness of the Trojan campaign, tend his hearth and provide him with some children.  
He might have even married her if she'd given him healthy sons.

Relta shook her head, dumbstruck.  
"I'd never be happy with you," she said at last. "I want to go."  
Achilles slowly stuffed the chiton back in the pouch, threw in the little bag of gold and closed it.  
"Fine," he said. "Leave."  
"My lord?"  
"Leave. If you want to leave, be gone before I come back. If you are still here, I'll take it that you've come to your senses and realised how futile that attempt would be."  
"You're not joking?"  
"About it being futile? No, I'm not. You're surrounded, my queen, surrounded by Achaeans, who will march you back to Agamemnon, and Trojans, who will deliver you to Priam. If they don't rape and kill you first."  
"I meant: joking about letting me leave," she said, as though she hadn't heard what he'd just said.

Achilles laughed coldly.  
"Think on it, my queen," he said. "You ought to think carefully before you make a decision. And if you are sensible, you will stay here. Staying with me, though, means an end to any of your attempts to run away. Is that clear?"  
"Yes, my lord," she replied. "I will consider it. Carefully."  
He threw the pouch roughly at her and she caught it, its weight almost knocking her backwards.  
Without another word or a backwards glance, he pulled on his robe and left the tent.

xXx

In broad strokes, he told Patroclus about the exchange. His cousin hesitated and then confessed that he'd caught her wandering about when the Achaeans had been on the battlefield.  
Achilles cursed under his breath. That little witch had been up and down the beach since the moment she'd clambered out of that chest.  
"She will not leave," Patroclus said reassuringly. "She's not stupid."

Achilles rolled his eyes.  
"And so what if he does?" he said, standing up. He stretched out a hand to Patroclus and pulled him up. "Let the little fool go. If she does not realise what I'm offering her, she doesn't deserve to have it. Plenty of women to take her place."  
He heaved his young cousin up into a standing position.  
"Enough about that accursed woman," said Achilles gruffly. "I have no need to waste another word on her."  
"She won't leave," Patroclus said again. "I am certain of it."  
"Enough!" his cousin cried, clapping him on the back. "We must find Eudorus and Monkey and discuss exactly what must do tonight."

They walked across the sand, Patroclus talking about the latest camp gossip.  
Achilles would not allow himself to look in the direction of his tent but finally, almost past it, he did. Ahma was standing outside, like a guard. When he caught her eye, she shook her head, a tiny movement.  
The White Queen was gone.  
Achilles felt a surge of anger.  
To Hades with her, he thought. The damned fool.  
He had more important things to think about that some white-skinned witch. He would banish her from his mind, that stupid woman. The fool, the damned fool.  
He set his sights on Agamemnon's tent, where Eudorus and the Monkey man were waiting patiently for him to arrive.


	19. 19

"I shall send that woman a present," Agamemnon said.  
He clapped Odysseus on the shoulder, a broad grin across his face.  
"Which woman?" the king of Ithaca asked, momentarily confused.  
Patroclus, at his side, looked at him horror-struck, and Odysseus had to nudge him sharply to get the young man to control his features.  
"His woman, the one he has taken up with," announced Agamemnon.  
Odysseus looked at him, his face purposely blank and enquiring. "My king?"

Agamemnon leaned in and Odysseus got a whiff of the rich oils the king perfumed his skin and hair with.  
"Nestor said he has taken a woman of late and we attribute this change in attitude to the influence of ... whoever she is."  
"You think his attitude has changed?"  
"Indeed. He was worse than a sulking youth and has been so a twelve-month now, at least. In the past few days, though ... laughing, joking, taking an interest in the men's training again. And this: look at this."

He pointed discreetly at Achilles, who was down on one knee, studying a sketch that Eudorus had made in charcoal on the floorboards. The walls of Troy had been sketched roughly, the towers and outlooks represented by uneven rectangles and squares. He was discussing it intently with Eudorus and Monkey, his brow furrowed, his entire focus directed at the drawing on the floor.  
"This is the Achilles of old. The killer, the warrior. My dog of war. See?"  
Agamemnon smiled in satisfaction and Odysseus looked at Patroclus, whose gaze was fixed on his feet.

He did see, indeed.  
Achilles was a man who needed constant challenge and once the siege of Troy had ground to a stalemate, the Myrmidon had quickly become bored and restless. Their successes on the dusty battlefield did little but gain them a couple more metres of Trojan sand, which their enemy eventually won back in one of the following battles. While Agamemnon countered his troops' boredom by insisting that they train rigorously – and death to anyone who refused – he could not make Achilles do it, nor, by extension, could he make the Myrmidons do something their leader refused. The black warriors trained when Achilles felt like it or saw fit, sometimes not for weeks on end. 

The Myrmidon prince drank too much, slept with any woman that took his fancy, including other men's slaves, and was barely civil to Agamemnon: he addressed him with studied politeness, hardly making an effort to mask the smirk that seemed to permanently hover on his lips. How Agamemnon itched to strike his handsome face with the butt of his whip, but he held himself back with great effort. The Achaeans mightn't have the capacity or the resources to win an outright battle against Troy, but Agamemnon knew they could pick, pick, pick away at them till they capitulated.  
And for that he needed the Myrmidons and the insolent Achilles.

Then, lo, a miracle: Achilles had returned from Kalios like a different man.  
After their scuffle on the beach, during which Agamemnon had put the dog in his place, Achilles had suddenly regained some of his appetite for the campaign. He'd turned up for training the next day, his men trudging reluctantly behind him, and he'd listened respectfully – or as respectfully as a man like Achilles could – when Agamemnon had shouted his orders. Nestor had been sent to see what had changed and reported back that the man had taken a new woman ... and finally seemed to have found some measure of contentment.

Agamemnon beamed at the Ithacan king.  
"A good woman," he said in satisfaction. "All he needed was the love of a good woman to calm him down and renew his ... vigour. We could've told him that, eh, Odysseus? I remember the ne'er-do-well you used to be, till Penelope tamed you."  
He offered Odysseus a comical wink, circling his large stomach with his hands.  
"So who is she? Some Kalion wench, no doubt. Frisky like their damn goats, those women."  
"He does like them frisky," Odysseus agreed, looking to Patroclus for help.  
The boy looked at him, agonised, shaking his head minutely.  
_No_ , he mouthed.  
"I'll send her a robe," the king of Greece said decisively and then let out a bark of a laugh. "I'll have my Lysana pick her out one of the robes they sent from that witch queen of theirs. His woman will surely get a kick out of wearing one of her own queen's chitons!"  
_By the gods,_ Odysseus thought, _this is my punishment for our deceit. Now he will send the queen one of her own stolen dresses as a reward for Achilles stealing her. How much worse can it get?_

Much worse, it turned out.

xXx

"What do you mean, she is gone?" he hissed, his back turned to the assembled kings.   
Achilles was still on one knee, quickly explaining the plan and where he wanted their troops to assemble. Odysseus had moved closer to hear, but Patroclus had grabbed his wrist and through gritted teeth whispered, "The she-wolf is gone."

"Does he know?" he nodded at Achilles, who was arguing with Phoenix.  
Patroclus gulped. "Yes. He let her go."  
"For gods' sake! Why?"  
"She wanted to go and he let her."  
His young cousin shrugged.  
"Is he ... is he ... ?"  
"He seems fine," Patrolus whispered, a little confused. "Just different. He's more – "  
"Focussed," Odysseus finished.

They both looked over at Achilles, who stood up when he caught their stares.  
He nodded coldly, slapped his thigh impatiently and cut through the gathered kings. Unlike the other men assembled, Achilles wore his black armour, while the other lords and their servants stood about in their embroidered robes. He faced Odysseus and said curtly, "The Ithacans will be ready to attack when I give the signal?"  
"Of course," was the smooth reply.  
"Good," Achilles said. "Because we end this tonight. I have had enough of this fool's campaign. I want to burn that damned city to the ground and go back home."


	20. 20

She was free.  
Free!

After Achilles had stormed out of the tent, Relta had repacked her pouch, her heart thumping.   
The realisation made her head reel and it took her only seconds to realise how painfully unprepared she was. She checked the little bag that contained the gold, counting the coins, even though she knew their number without checking.

Then she unwrapped the thick black cloth that held the runestones and turned them over: they were ivory, the runic symbols had been carefully carved out by Kalion craftsmen and inked in black. She'd had them made as a gift for her mother when she had married Kalii: she thought she had found something her mother would appreciate and treasure. 

But her mother had unwrapped them and laughed out loud: what magic could these runes possibly hold, made out of this godless bone? Runestones had to be made of elkbones or ash-wood, Relta should know that, child of the isles as she was. Flanna had pushed them back at her daughter, who'd wrapped them back up in their black cloth, heart-stricken. Relta had tucked them away in the purse with the gold Kalii had given her on their wedding, her beautiful present suddenly rendered worthless. Achilles had not bothered to look at them when he emptied her bag and Relta did not know what he would have made of the little discs with their strange symbols scratched into the smooth white bone.

She rolled the thick cloak she'd taken from the trunk on the ship and tied it with leather strips into a fat sausage, which she slung over the strap of her pouch, then tied up her hair in a grubby cloth and fixed her chiton.  
At that moment, the leather curtain was briskly pushed back and she froze, expecting Achilles.   
Instead it was Ahma, who screeched when she saw her.  
"Yes, I'm leaving," Relta said briskly. "And he knows. He knows," she repeated, thrusting her face into Ahma's. "He let me go."  
"Where you go?" the woman asked suspiciously.  
Relta paused.  
Where, indeed?  
Kalios was south, so not south.  
Troy was east, so not east.  
Greece was west – but unreachable without a boat.  
All that remained was north; but what was north of Troy? Her map didn't cover the lands north of Greece because she'd never expected to cross them.

Ahma shook her head sorrowfully.  
"Achilles, no," she said. "Achilles, no, no."  
"He let me go," Relta repeated briskly and tried not to think of him.  
When she blinked, she had a flashing image of his blue eyes, the small scar on his cheekbone, the inquisitive look on his face. His quick laugh, his long fingers, his broad back.  
She shook her head to clear the images from her mind.  
Enough of that sentimental nonsense.  
He'd been a good lover, a pleasant interlude, but she had a path to follow and he was not on it.  
She swallowed. That was that.

"Goodbye," she said and pushed past Ahma. "Thank you for the baths. I've never been as clean in my life."  
The older woman grabbed her wrist. Relta made to shake her off, but the Abyssinian squeezed it tight.  
"There," she said, pointing. "Go there. Over hill, small village."  
"A small village?"  
"Yes, maybe also boat."  
Relta stared at her, not sure whether she was being tricked. Ahma nodded at her and jabbed her finger in the same direction.  
"You gold?" she asked and it took Relta a minute or two to figure out what she was asking.  
"I have some gold," she replied cautiously.

Still holding her wrist, Ahma led her over to a small casket and flipped it open. Inside were Greek coins; the little woman grabbed a handful and stuff them into Relta's pouch.  
"But won't Achilles - ?" she began in alarm as the old woman closed the casket firmly.  
Ahma snorted and Relta understood what she meant: the floor of Achilles' tent was littered with loot picked up from various sources; he would not miss a clutch of gold coins.  
"You go home?" asked Ahma.  
"Yes," Relta answered, her voice resolute. "I am going home."  
"Ah," Ahma said, a sigh with a touch of wistfulness.   
Home.  
"All luck," Ahma said and smiled, showing a toothless grin, her gums dark and stained.  
"Thank you," she replied simply.

She paused at the door of the tent to smile her thanks at the older woman. Ahma nodded her head, an expression on her face that looked a little like envy.


	21. 21

Timon intercepted her on her way over the dunes. He came running up the sand, his narrow face a picture of worry.  
"My lady!" he cried. "Do not do it! My lady!"  
Relta turned on him and grabbed his arm.  
"Hush!" she scolded, glancing around.  
The only other people nearby were those on the rough road that led to the little village north of the Achaean settlement. A man with a cart and oxen glanced at her curiously and she looked away.  
"Achilles will – " he began.  
"He knows," she said shortly. "He let me go. He _did_ ," she added crossly, seeing the doubt flit across his face. "I told him I didn't want to stay with him and he let me go."  
"You are not lying?" Timon asked hesitantly.  
"I give you my word of honour," she said squaring up to him. "I am free to leave. I just – "  
Her voice faltered.  
"- I just don't know where to go."

Timon drew a deep breath and looked around.  
"The village – if you ask at the village, you might find someone willing to take you on one of the fishing boats. Maybe to the far shore. Have you gold?"  
"Yes," she said. "I have enough."  
She patted her leather pouch.  
Timon smiled at her with a touch of pity.  
"That might be enough for a man," he said, "but a woman travelling alone would need a case of gold to get across the sea unscathed."

Relta felt despair rise again.  
"I can bargain," she said, with more conviction than she felt.  
Timon smiled at her again, and again she saw that look of resigned pity on his face.  
"My lady," he said quietly, "You will not even reach that village without one of the Greeks scooping you up and taking you back to his tent. As far as any man on this beach is concerned, you are a runaway slave. This much I can promise you."  
She cursed silently, bit her lip.  
Timon looked at her for a moment, considering, then said, "Very well. I will take you to the village and make sure you find a boat that will take you."  
"Will you?" she cried. "Really? I can pay you – I have enough, I promise."  
He patted her arm.  
"Keep your gold," he said and started to trudge through the sand towards the road.  
Relta scurried after him.  
"Why are you helping me?" she called.  
Timon's narrow shoulders rose and fell in a shrug.  
"I don't rightly know," he confessed. "Chances are, Achilles will have me whipped if he finds out."  
"He won't find out," Relta said and fell into step beside him.  
Timon looked towards the village in the distance and smiled grimly.  
"He'll find out," he said. "He always does."

xXx

Timon negotiated passage for her with a wizened old fisherman and gave him a coin to let her spend the night in his shack with his equally wizened wife and their smelly dog. They would sail at daybreak.  
"She will pay you when you land safely," Timon growled. "And if I ever hear that she did not land safely, I will hunt you down and kill you, then kill your wife and slit this stinking dog's throat!"  
The old couple gasped and looked nervously from him to Relta, who tried to appear as unthreatening and benign as possible.  
Then Timon planted a quick, shy kiss on her cheek, squeezed her arm and left her standing outside their door, feeling awkward.

The old woman gestured for her to come in and she went inside, blinking in darkness and coughing at the smoke from the fire.  
"You a slave?" she asked gruffly.  
"I am a freewoman," Relta replied.  
The fisherwoman snorted.  
"You look like one of their whores," she said.  
"Well, I'm not."

It was hard to remain equable, but there was no point in antagonising her hosts, so Relta smiled at her politely.  
The old woman raised an eyebrow and stirred a pot.  
"What was you then, if you wasn't a slave?" she asked.  
"I'm a ... I'm a seer," Relta said. The words popped out of her mouth.  
It's what they had always said, she and her mother, they were seers. They read the runes, they saw the future.  
"Oh?" the woman asked, looking up.  
"Yes, I am just passing through, moving to the next town. I was planning to visit the Trojan court but I think I'll have to abandon that plan. The siege has even made it difficult for me to reach the mainland."

What a flimsy lie, she thought, but the old woman was already wiping down her hands on her shabby robe.  
"Can you read my palm?" she asked, thrusting a dirty hand at Relta.  
"I don't read palms," she said. "I have ... stones. Magic stones."  
"Read me stones, then," the woman demanded.  
_Damn it_ , Relta thought crossly, annoyed with herself.  
But she smiled and replied, "Certainly. Maybe we can go outside where there is more light?"

She squatted on the ground outside and carefully extracted the runestones from her pouch without jangling the coins. She sat on the leather bag and made herself comfortable. Then she began the routine she had done so often with her mother in attendance.

"What do you wish to know?" she said, lowering her voice so the old lady had to move closer to hear her.  
Relta stared at her intently, concentrating on her lined face.  
"My son," she whispered, "is he still alive?"  
"Tell me about him," Relta said, cupping the stones in her hands.  
The woman spoke of the boy, the young man, who had gone north to Abydos, to join the army and make his fortune, but Menelaus had sacked the city for supplies – had he survived?  
Relta laid a cool hand on hers, placed the tips of two fingers on the old woman's forehead and said some nonsense in her own language – the words of a song her mother had sung her as a child. Then she silently laid the runestones.

"This one represents the yew," she said, "It represents the virtue of patience, of stoicism. He cannot be with you right now but he wishes he were, but he endures the separation with great courage. He thinks of home often because this stone shows the birch, which symbolises the family. Wherever he is now, he thinks of you often and would like to return, but something is preventing him from doing so..."  
She glanced up. The old woman was hanging on her every word, her face anxious.  
"But he will return?"

Relta made a show of selecting the next stone.  
She turned it over and stroked the lines on its white surface. She paused, frowning.  
"He will," she said finally.  
The fisherwoman gasped.  
"This represents the beacon, the light that shines in the darkness. He will find his way back to you but it will take some time. You must have faith in his return."  
She scooped up the stones.  
"That is all," she said solemnly.  
The other woman stood up, gathering her robe in her worn hands. She rushed to the fence that separated the rough scrub in front of her house from the next and shouted,  
"Lysa! Lysa, come here! We've got a seer staying with us!"  
Curse me, gods, thought Relta grimly.  
"Is she any good?" Lysa said, her broad face sun-reddened and veined.  
"She is amazing," the fisherwoman said. "She has magic stones. Come quickly."

She read the runes of the neighbouring women and their men, when they came back from their boats. Listening carefully, she picked up titbits about the neighbours as the audience whispered and she recycled the information with a thoughtful frown.  
"How could she know?" someone asked.  
_Because I have ears and I can hear you_ , she thought. _People are so gullible_.  
Her host squatted in the sand opposite her and said,  
"Tell me, seer, will this siege end soon?"  
Relta felt her stomach twist. If only they knew. It might very well end faster than they imagined.  
She laid out the stones and pretended to study them.  
"This stone represents hail," she said.  
The people looked at her blankly.  
"Like rain, but very cold. Ice," she added, but they shook their heads.  
She smiled to herself and tried to remember what her mother used to call it for these people who lived in a land of blue skies.

"This stone represents thunder," she improvised. "It can be heard in the distance, rumbling its warnings. It is the sound of coming destruction, a coming battle. And this – "  
She paused for a moment and looked at the stone in her hand.  
"This is the stone of change. Something will change: a death with occur or some obstacle will be scaled – "  
"Like the walls of Troy?" the fisherman said quickly.

She hesitated.  
Oh no.  
"Perhaps not _literally_ ," she said. "Not necessarily an actual wall. It can also mean a challenge – "  
"But it could also mean that walls will be scaled?"  
"Yes, I suppose so but what it probably means is that – "

The fisherman sat back on his heels and nodded up at the men who stood around him.  
"See?" he said gruffly.  
"Aye."  
"Aye, it's true then, what they say."  
"Ivos saw them with his own eyes, he said something was up."  
"What do the stones say about Achilles?" the fisherman snapped.  
Relta felt her intestines turn to ice.  
"Achilles?" she croaked.  
"Aye, the Myrmidon. There's a rumour that he's going to attack the walls of Troy."  
She felt her mouth open and close wordlessly.  
Trying to buy time, she gathered the stones in her hand and clasped them, feeling their comforting coolness. She lay them facedown on the sand, let her fingers hover over them, then selected one at random.

She turned it over.  
"Hey," one of the fishermen said excitedly, "That's the one we had already."  
"That's right," her host said. "That one means thunder, doesn't it? The coming destruction?"  
"Well, it might also mean change – " she tried again, but excited chatter had broken out among the villagers.  
"We must take her to King Priam," the fisherwoman said decisively. "He will surely listen to her – look, she knew about the lump in Lysa's side – "  
"No," Relta said, panicking. "No, I simply cannot – I couldn't possibly – "  
"You said you had planned to go to Troy," the fisherwoman said. "We know of ways to smuggle you in. Now we knows you ain't no Achaean spy."  
"Oh, I might still be a spy!" she laughed gaily, a note of hysteria in her voice. "I'm sure Priam won't have time for the ramblings of a humble seer!"  
"We must take her," one of the men said and hauled her to her feet. "Come, seer, we will take you now so that they may be ready for those Greek sons of whores."  
"Please," she began weakly but the man who had pulled her up was marching her towards the middle of the village, followed by a taggle of neighbours.  
"Desos!" he cried, flagging a man with a cart down, "are you heading for the city?"  
"Aye, to be sure," the man said.  
"You have to take me and this woman with you," the fisherman said. "King Priam must hear what she has to say."

xXx

They did not head for the main gate, watched by the Achaean spies. Instead they wove their way around the side of the great walls where a small trickle of people was heading through a narrow and heavily-armed gate.

Relta looked about, confused. She was perched on a sack on the back of the cart, next to the bony frame of the fisherman.  
"The city – I thought the city was under total siege?" she said.  
The fisherman, Pel, and Desos laughed.  
"Aye, total siege," Pel said scornfully. "As long as we pretend that's the case, eh, Desos?"  
"What do you mean?" she asked.  
"The Achaeans and the Trojans have been trading nigh-on three years now. 'Cept no one admits it, right? The Trojans have salt stores and horses, the Greeks have fish and weapons. Not to mention the fact that the Trojans have women – they're plenty valuable too, I hear."  
Pel rubbed his shoulder against hers and she moved away, trying not to shudder.

The cart rumbled to a stop and two Trojan sentries came forward. Relta looked up the towering wall. Up close, it seemed to reach to the sky, its stone the same colour as the sand beneath their feet. On both of the two-level ramparts there was a line of archers, their arrows trained on their cart.

"We have a seer from – where are you from, girl?" Desos called and turned to poke her.  
"North, the Northern Islands," she said.  
Pel tugged the cloth on her head and showed some of her hair.  
"She's really pale," he said. "Look at her! I think it's true."  
"What does she want?" one of the sentries said.  
"She has valuable information for the king," Desos said importantly.  
"It's not information," Relta began, "More of a – "  
"Is that so?" the sentry said, ignoring her.  
"Aye, it is. It's information the king will want to hear. Believe me."  
The sentry looked at them suspiciously.  
"I don't know if I can really trouble the king with my little prophecies," she said with her most charming smile - but her demurral had the opposite effect to the one she'd hoped for.  
The sentry eyed her and sneered, "You trying to withhold information from our king?"  
"No, it's just that – it's just a prophecy."  
"You don't believe in your own prophecies?" he asked sharply and she was momentarily at a loss for words.  
"Proceed," the sentry said. "You can talk to Captain Lysander first and see if what you have to say needs to reach the king's ear."

Pel slid down off the back of the cart and Relta followed. They waited while the soldiers checked the cart and then followed it through heavy gate. Inside, she looked curiously around. The city's houses were neat, white cloth curtains hung at the windows to keep out the sun and the breeze, window boxes looked tended. The roads were clean and paved, the great city walls on the inside bore ornamental carvings, as though decoration might make them seem less like the fortification they were.

"Wait here," the sentry said sternly. "I will find Lysander – wait, there he is!"  
Relta spun around and saw a man in the Trojan tunic coming down the rampart steps.  
"Captain!" the sentry called out. "One of the villagers says this woman here has valuable information about the Achaeans' plan for attack."  
Lysander stepped closer and behind him she spotted a slight young man, his dark hair bound back by gold rings. He wore the cobalt blue of royalty and he looked at her with open curiosity.  
Relta felt an urge to run. He had to be one of Priam's sons and, given his relative youth, she guessed it was the younger one.  
She was right.

"Prince Paris," the sentry said and bowed smartly. "This is a seer from the Northern Islands. This villager says she has prophesied an attack by the Greeks."  
"I just interpret the stones," she said, shooting the prince a disarming smile. "My interpretation might well be wrong. It probably is."  
"And what did these stones say?" said the Prince. He had a light, melodious voice and when he looked at her, his handsome eyes danced.  
She searched for the words but Pel beat her to it.  
"She said that Achilles is on the horizon, like the thunder of coming destruction, and that he will scale our walls."

Paris looked at her, his face a study in naked dismay, and Relta realised with a shock that he knew: he knew about the Achaeans' plan.  
_But how? How did he know?_  
He pressed his lips together, his brow furrowed.  
"Take her to my quarters," he said. "I will question her personally. Myself. She is _my_ prisoner. Do not tell my father of this until I establish whether she is telling the truth."  
The sentry grabbed her arm and marched her down the street.  
"But I – please, your majesty, Prince Paris – " she called, twisting around.  
But Paris was deep in conversation with his captain of the guard. He simply glanced up and waved at the sentry to carry on.


	22. 22

"You do not shoot them until they are on the battlements," Hector said. "Do you hear me, brother? We wait until they stand before us, then we attack."  
"But Hector, why let them get that far?" Paris argued. "If I can get a clear shot, I can shoot them straight off their cursed rope, like apples from a tree. Nothing could be easier."  
"It will be pitch dark," Hector reminded him patiently. "And I have no doubt that they will be wearing dark clothing. As soon as you fire an arrow, they will all be alerted to our presence and they'll get away. They're not going to send many men, but the ones they send will be their best. If we have a chance to kill Achilles without fifty Myrmidons behind him, then we will take that chance and kiss the hands of the gods in thanks."

Paris bit his lip in annoyance.  
As usual, Hector was taking over. Paris' plan was simple and straightforward: find where they planned to climb the wall, kill the first man over the top and shoot the others behind them as they hung from the rope, thirty metres from the ground. If an arrow through the eye didn't kill them, the fall to the hard sand below certainly would. Now Hector wanted to let the Greeks climb the wall, thinking their plan had succeeded, and ambush them as they came off the ramparts. Paris knew that Hector was playing with the idea of taking hostages: what kind of leverage would he have, if he had Agamemnon's best men in the dungeons of Troy? Could he strong-arm the Achaean king into leaving their beaches in return for Achilles' freedom?

His brother was a fool, Paris thought.  
Agamemnon didn't want to negotiate and trade like a horse dealer.  
He knew the so-called king of kings wanted nothing less than total defeat, he wanted to see Troy reduced to ashes and dust. Hector's continued hope that they could come to a truce irritated Paris almost beyond words. His older brother's unvanquished belief in the best of other men was both his most admirable trait ... and his greatest failing.

"Very well," he muttered.  
He would do as he always did: what he thought best.  
And he would do it as he always did: without telling Hector.  
He would not have his older brother steal his glory.  
Paris had told Hector that the archers thought the invaders would try the southern end of the wall, the one not overlooked directly by a guard tower, but Paris and Iason had discussed it and agreed that the northern end was the more likely target. Paris could not be everywhere on the wall, he had to pick an end to defend, so he went with his gut instinct and made his way to the section guarded by Iason and two others. He ducked down behind the wall, his eye trained to the slit in the stones, trying to make out a figure in the darkness. But there was nothing, save the flickering of the camp fires on the beach. The Trojan walls looked quiet, but the extra men were crouched behind the walls, Hector's troop was assembled below the ramparts. Paris shivered with anticipation, with excitement, and ran his fingers along the string of his bow. All he had to do now was wait.

xXx

He was shoved awake. Iason's face loomed over his, a finger to his lips.  
"My Prince," he whispered and beckoned.  
They crawled along the ramparts in the darkness.  
"Listen," Iason said.  
They heard a low grunt, then another. Paris' hand flew to his quiver, but Iason held him back.  
"Let him come over the wall, my lord. Then we'll slit his throat, hang the rope and let the others come up," his whispered.

Paris nodded and waited. His knees juddered with adrenalin as he heard the soft sounds of the climber's exertion coming closer and closer. Finally a small hand reached over the top of the stone, then an arm, and then a head appeared. Iason held Paris firmly, his arm gripping him like a vice. The climber pulled himself over the wall, crouching low and looking around furtively, like a hunted animal.  
"Now," Iason whispered and crept forward, launching himself at the man's legs. The climber collapsed and one of the other guards clamped a hand over his mouth. Iason pulled a dagger and slit the climber's throat then, to Paris' astonishment, heaved the warm corpse up so the man's head and torso were visible over the wall. Like a puppet, Iason waved the dead man's arm.

"Now," he said in satisfaction, "now we secure the rope, young prince, and wait for the sons of whores to climb it."  
Paris sprang into action and helped fix the rope, barely able to suppress the grin that split his face wide. They let it drop silently, slithering down the height of the wall, and then they sat back on their heels, waiting. The rope immediately went taut as it took the weight of a man. It juddered against the wall.  
"They are climbing," Iason whispered in satisfaction.  
"I will wait until the bastards are close enough for me to look them in the eye," Paris growled, "then they will taste my arrows."  
In the darkness, Paris saw the white of Iason's teeth as he grinned.

One of their men came towards them, scurrying along the rampart with his back ducked so he would not be seen over the wall.  
"My lord, my lord prince is coming!" he whispered urgently.  
"What?" Paris hissed.  
"Your brother, Prince Hector, is coming. He's seen the men on the wall, he is coming, my lord!"  
Paris turned his head away to curse in the darkness.  
Damn Hector. Damn him.

"Wait, my lord," Iason said. "He is not close enough. Listen."  
They heard the very faint sound of a man's heavy breathing as he pulled himself up the thick rope.  
The guards along the wall stirred, almost imperceptibly, and Paris knew his older brother was on the ramparts, making his way along through the men, hurrying to stop Paris from taking his kill shot.

The young prince drew his arrow, listening.  
The sounds were coming closer. He looked over at Iason and the older man held up a finger, paused – and then nodded.

Paris stood and leaned over the wall.  
There, metres below him, he saw a shadowy figure. As he drew his bow, the sound of the taut string stretching made the man on the rope look up and Paris saw the whites of his eyes in a dark face. It was all he needed: he took aim and fired.

The arrow whizzed and there was a thwack as it found a target.  
Paris looked down, heard a grunt, but the man kept coming. The Greek called out something over his shoulder but Paris couldn't hear what the man said; then the rope juddered and he knew the men below the one he'd just shot were shimmying down as fast as they could. He aimed again.  
"Paris!"  
Hector's voice rang out across the battlements.  
Paris squinted in the darkness and aimed again. The man on the rope had stopped climbing, had pressed himself against the wall in attempt to camouflage his form in the darkness. As he did so, his hood or head covering fell back and Paris saw his blond hair.  
"Show yourself, you coward!" Paris shouted angrily.  
He loosed an arrow and it flew, making no contact.  
"Paris!" Hector roared.  
"Are you Achilles, the mighty warrior?" jeered Paris. "Climb this wall and fight me! Did Agamemnon send you to take my woman? Come and get her!"

He heard footsteps on the battlements.  
It was Hector – he was making no attempt to hide. Paris couldn't see his face but even the dull glint of his armour seemed to radiate his brother's fury.  
"Iason," Paris said calmly. "Cut the rope."  
Iason pulled the dagger – still bloody – and started to saw through the thick rope.  
The man on the rope swung out a little and started to climb again, as though inflamed by Paris' taunts. The prince aimed again and fired – missed.  
Then he fired again. There was a satisfying thwack once again as it made contact, and this time the man yelped, a surprised shout of pain.

The rope juddered once more and Iason sawed more furiously.  
"Paris!" Hector said and grabbed his brother's arm to pull him back, but Paris was leaning over the wall. The young prince whipped out his knife and pushed Iason aside. He sawed furiously, keeping Hector at arm's length, even as his brother struggled to pull the knife out of his hand.

The rope frayed; split.  
Paris leaned over the wall and saw the climber's eyes, wide with shock, with fear. The man fell back into the darkness as though he were tumbling in to the river Styx: gone, gone, gone.

Then a hair-raising crack as a body hit stone.

Paris turned to his brother, who was speechless with rage.  
"I have killed Achilles," he said.  
"How do you know?" replied Hector through gritted teeth. "How do you know it was Achilles? Did you put an arrow through his eye? Through his neck?"  
"I hit him," Paris said. "And no one could survive that fall, brother. Are you crazy? Unless he sprouted wings as he fell, there is no way he could have survived – "

But Hector wasn't listening. Leaning over the battlements to peer into the darkness, he shouted, "Archers! Attack!"  
A hail of arrows flew to the ground below, thudding on metal and flesh. There were screeches of pain as men were hit, though who was hit and how many was impossible to see in the darkness.

"You messed it up," Hector said. "You idiot, Paris. You idiot. This was our best chance of finally ending that Myrmidon devil and you didn't follow orders."  
"I killed him," his younger brother said stubbornly. "Why won't you listen? No man could survive that fall. How high is that wall? He surely broke his neck and half a dozen bones when he fell."

Hector grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him hard. The archers standing around looked away in embarrassment.  
"This is Achilles," he hissed. "Until I have his bleeding corpse in front of me, until I see his rotting body burn on a funeral pyre, I will not believe that bastard dead."  
"But brother – "  
"Get out of my sight," Hector spat and pushed him away.  
He turned on his heel and stormed off down the battlements, ignoring the men who bowed as he passed.


	23. 23

Relta stood on her toes and peered through the bars of the cell, seeing bare feet, sandalled feet, scurrying by. The window wasn't much than a barred slit at ground level and she had no doubt that all the rainwater and its accumulated waste flowed down into the cell on wet days. She'd been kept in a small room off Prince Paris' chambers for a few hours and, just when she thought she'd die of thirst, Lysander opened the door and walked in, followed by two other guards. He pulled off his helmet, the long plume of horsehair making a gentle swish as he set it down on the table.

He'd looked at her silently.  
"May I have something to drink?" she asked politely.  
He said something in a low voice to one of the men and then sat on the edge of the table beside her chair.  
"You're a seer?" he said.  
The guard returned with a jug and goblet. Relta poured herself some watered wine and gulped it down.  
"Yes," she gasped.  
"From the Northern Isles? Just passing through?"  
His voice was sceptical, his eyebrow raised in disbelief.  
"Yes."  
"Through the Achaean camp?"  
"Not on purpose, but yes."  
"You're not a slave, you say."  
"I'm not a slave, no. I'm a free woman."  
"Hmm," Lysander said.  
He looked at her for a couple of minutes, and then said, "Come with me."

She followed him docilely at first, till she realised where they were going: down through the servants' quarters, down past the curious faces of the kitchen servants, out through the courtyard where palace clothes were washed and down towards the dungeons.  
"No!" she'd cried but one of the men had grabbed her before she could make a dash and she was dragged, scratching and thumping, down the dark steps into the musty dungeon. Lysander called out something to the guards because she couldn't hear it over the yowls and whistles of the other prisoners, who stretched their arms out through the bars to pull her robe and pinch her as she was pulled past their cells. Lysander brought her to the last one, which contained no one else, and shoved her inside.  
"I'll arrange food and wine for you," he said shortly.  
"Please," she begged, grabbing the bars, "I don't know what you think I did, but this is a mistake."  
"I don't think you did anything," Lysander said. "I just want to keep you somewhere safe till we're ready to find out more about you."  
"But in a cell?"  
"What?" he said, his face blank. "It even has a window. Why are you complaining, woman?"

And he turned on his heel and left.  
Some time later, one of the guards unlocked the door and leering at her through his rotten teeth, he handed over a jug of wine and a bowl with a kind of gruel inside.  
"My lady witch," he said with exaggerated politeness and spat in the bowl before he handed it over.  
She almost cried.

The day had been long and it stretched slowly into night. She pushed the wooden bench that seemed to be the bed up against the wall, so she could stand on it and peer outside. Relta could see that the cell window looked out onto a street, but there weren't many people outside. She tried calling, but anyone who heard her only looked down and hurried off, startled.

Her brain rattled: tonight was the night Achilles and his men intended to scale the Trojan walls.  
What if he succeeded?  
Oh, Danu, mother goddess, what if he didn't?  
She bit her knuckles, knees jittering nervously.

Finally, in total darkness, she lay on the bench and listened to something running around the cell – rats? mice? – enjoying the bowl of gruel she'd left on the floor.  
At least if they were satisfied with the gruel, she thought, they might leave her in peace. Listening for the sound of approaching rats took her mind of the other sounds her ears were straining to hear. Sounds of attack, sounds of battle. Anything.

But all she heard was the nightwatchman, animals lowing in the darkness. The night was still, the sky cloudy and silently black without the light of the moon. Relta squeezed her eyes shut, even though she thought she wouldn't be able to sleep ... but she must have, because the patter of footsteps woke her.

She stood up on the bench, on her toes, and peered out the window. The street was far busier now: people were hurrying, running, she could hear excited voices urging others to come on and hurry up.  
"Excuse me!" she called, stretching her hand out through the bars. "Excuse me!"  
It was only wide enough to squeeze her hand through but she waved her fingers frantically.  
Suddenly a child's face appeared at the slit and then another's. She almost jumped in fright.  
"Are you a prisoner?" one of them said. "What did you do?"  
"I – nothing – it's a mistake," she replied, smiling at them in her most friendly way, hoping they wouldn't run off. "What's going on?"  
"Prince Paris has slain the mighty Achilles!" one of the children said.  
Relta grabbed the bars.  
"He was trying to climb the walls and Prince Paris shot him through the eye with an arrow!" the other said.  
"Through the eye!" the first one chimed in. "He plunged to his death. His skull splattered open on the rocks – splat!"  
"Is this true?" she said hoarsely.  
"It is!"

At that moment the children were yanked away from the window and a woman's angry face peered down through the bars.  
"Wench," she snarled and Relta drew back in fright, watching her feet disappear.  
She sank down on the bench.  
Achilles was dead.  
She tried not to picture the golden one with an arrow through his eye, his brains splattered all over the Trojan sand, but the image kept flashing through her mind. She pressed her hands against her eyes, pressing the image away and the tears in.  
"What do you care if he's dead?" she whispered to herself. "He was going to die eventually anyway. You just didn't think you'd be around to hear it. Forget it, forget him. You have to get out of here, you have to get out of here."

She drew her legs up and placed her forehead on her knees, her eyes shut tightly, her hands over her ears to block out the sound of cheering and celebrations. Somewhere outside the citizens of Troy were whooping at the Prince's victory over the Greek dog of war.  
"Forget it, forget it," she whispered.

She whispered it over and over because when she was whispering, she could hear nothing else: not the cheers, not the happy laughter from the street ... not the sound of the cell door quietly opening.

Only when someone cleared his throat did she look up.  
The man opposite her was in one of the royal blue robes, he had the same dark hair as his brother, but while his brother's face bore the traces of irrepressible mischief, this man's countenance was serious. He clicked his fingers and one of the guards at the door brought in a wooden stool. The Prince adjusted it so it stood steadily on the crooked flagstones on the floor, then he sat, his hands resting on his knees as though he were sitting on a throne.

She slid to her feet, but he gestured for her to sit, so she did.  
Outside came the faint sound of a crowd cheering. The Prince seemed to wince, a tiny motion that was barely more than a little shudder.  
"You say you are a seer," he said.  
"Yes, my lord," she answered.  
"You're not a very good one, then," Hector said. "Or you would've seen this coming."  
He smiled at her, almost kindly. She found herself smiling back.  
"I'm not really very good at all," she confessed.  
"Yet the villagers who brought you here maintain you knew about the attack last night."  
"They interpreted my words that way," Relta said carefully.  
She did not want to lie to this man; not because she felt she owed him truth, but because he would know she was lying.

Hector looked at her, studying her hair, the skin on her arms, her robe.  
He was quiet for a few minutes, stroking his beard.  
"You must have come through the Greek camp," he said thoughtfully. "But from where? I thought you were a slave – "  
She shook her head and opened her mouth to protest but he silenced her with a click of his fingers.  
"... because no Greek woman has that colouring. But then I remembered that Agamemnon recently sent his men on a foray to Kalios; looking for tribute, I believe."  
She said nothing.  
"And I remember hearing that Nikephoras and Damaris had taken power without any resistance from the old Queen of Kalios, Kalion's white queen, because she'd disappeared. Without a trace. We even had Kalion traders outside the walls a week back, telling the story of how the she-wolf had slunk off into the darkness one night, gone as stealthily as she had ever arrived."

Hector leaned back, looking pleased with himself.  
"It is a coincidence, you must admit." He counted it off on his fingers: "White Queen disappears. Greeks go to Kalios. Red-headed woman appears at the gates of Troy."  
He nodded in satisfaction.  
"My captain of the guard is a clever man. Lysander thought that seemed a little odd."  
"Not that much of a coincidence," she said, dry-mouthed. "Plenty of foreigners pass through."  
"Pass Troy?" Hector laughed. "I don't think it's anyone's idea of a desirable destination. Not any more. Do you?"  
She had no answer to that.

"And," he said argumentatively, "the other thing that I seem to remember about the White Queen is that she was a seer, a witch, from the Northern Isles and she arrived in Kalion with her mother, who was also a seer . They say the King went to Crete and was bewitched by these two orange-haired women and he brought them back to Kalios."  
Hector threw his hands up in mock surprise.  
"Lo and behold! I have a flame-haired, white-skinned seer from the north in my cell."  
He smiled at her and his smile was gentle.  
Relta felt torn: his face was kind and he was looking at her with open curiosity. He looked like an honourable man.

Somewhere outside the crowd cheered again.  
They both glanced up at the window.  
Relta picked her words carefully.  
"What are they celebrating?" she asked.  
Hector shook his head ruefully.  
"They think Paris has killed Achilles."  
"Has he?"  
The words barely came out, but she tried to say them firmly, factually, to belie nothing.  
"Paris thinks so," Hector said, looking away.  
She felt her breath stop.  
He turned his head and studied her.  
"Did he bring you here? Or was it the other one, the Ithacan?"

What was the point? Relta thought. What was the point in lying?  
"They both did," she said, throwing her hands up in resignation. "Mostly Achilles," she added.  
_Golden limbs, skin bloodied, face shattered, bones broken._  
"You were with him? In the camp?"  
"Yes."  
With him? Yes, I've been with him.  
_Honey skin, strong limbs, scar on his cheek, stubble on his jaw, rough to the touch._  
Relta didn't take her eyes off Hector, tried to keep her face neutral, while her stomach turned.  
Hector pulled his beard thoughtfully and said, "What about Agamemnon? I thought he – "  
"He didn't know."  
"Did you escape?"  
"He let me go," she whispered.  
"I am sorry," said Hector and he seemed to truly mean it, even if she was not sure whether he was sorry because she'd been taken or sorry because Achilles was dead.

He stood up and extended a hand.  
"Well, my Queen, this is no place for you to stay. I am sure we can find you more comfortable quarters."  
"I'm no longer a queen," she said, hesitating.  
He stretched his hand out.  
"Former Queen," he said. "Come along. You've enjoyed the Greek hospitality, now it's time to try the Trojan."  
He smiled at her, his brown eyes warm.  
Relta stood up, straightening herself to her full height.  
"All I want to do is leave," she said calmly. "I don't want to harm anyone, I don't want to aid anyone, I just want to go back to where I came from. Please," she said. "Please believe me."  
"I believe you," said Prince Hector. "And you are free to leave whenever you wish – whenever it's safe, that is. In the meantime, you can tell us a little bit about the Achaean camp and about the great warrior Achilles."  
"But he's dead," she said, as he stood aside to let her pass in the doorway.  
_Arms bent, legs broken, skull smashed._

Hector bent his head to hers so he could whisper conspiratorially.  
"Can I tell you a secret, majesty? I don't believe it. Do you?"  
She looked at him enquiringly. "But your brother said – "  
"I have seen that man wounded in ways that would kill a thousand others," Hector said. "I would wager that he lives." He looked at her with an assessing expression on his face and added, "Would that make you happy, White Queen?"  
"Whether he lives or dies is not my concern," she said without emotion. "And it never was."

Hector smiled.  
"My lady," he said, inclining his head and indicating that she should walk on ahead.


	24. 24

Odysseus ran through the darkness, his shield over his head, battered by the arrows that whizzed down from above. He scrabbled across the sand to where Patroclus and Eudorus knelt with two of the Myrmidons standing over them. Achilles lay in a heap, his limbs at impossible angles; the two Myrmidon warriors were trying to hold their shields over their fallen leader's body, but even in the brief moments Odysseus was there, one of them gave a low groan as an arrow landed in the sole of his boot.

"Is he alive?" Odysseus cried.  
As if in answer, Achilles moaned.  
"We need to get him out of here," Odysseus said. "Now."  
"How?" Patroclus' face was chalk-white in the darkness, his eyes wild. "We cannot move him. Look at him."

He whipped off the black cloak covering Achilles' lower body and pointed at something white.  
An arrow thudded on Odysseus' shield; the tip pierced the wood next to his ear and he shifted the shield's weight.  
Odysseus squinted. "Is that his - ?"  
"Bone," Eudorus finished grimly. "That's his fucking _leg_ , my lord."  
"If he stays here, he will definitely die – and so will we. Get him out of here. Patroclus, your shield. We lift him on to it and run."  
"But the arrows, Odysseus – "  
"We _run_ ," the Ithacan said. "Fast. Faster than you've ever run before."

He didn't wait for them to answer. He put his arms under Achilles' shoulders and yanked him onto the upturned shield. His friend's dead weight and long body made the task so grimly impossible, it might have been comical in other circumstances but here, in the darkness of a moonless night, with the relentless thudding of Trojan arrows, it was anything but funny. Achilles face was dark with blood; Odysseus had to wipe his hands on his cloak because they were sticky and wet. He didn't want to think about why.

They managed to load Achilles onto the shield somehow, and then they heaved him up and ran, slipping and sliding in the sand. Odysseus realised quickly that the Trojans on the wall could not see them: they were soon out of range of their arrows, which continued to whizz and thud onto the empty sand.  
They stopped at a dune, drawing deep ragged breaths and Patroclus pointed at the waiting chariots.  
"We need to get him back to camp," he gasped.  
As carefully as they could, they placed him on the floor of the chariot and Patroclus knelt beside him. Odysseus took the reins.  
"Cousin, don't die," Patroclus begged but Achilles' head just lolled backwards.  
"Go," Patroclus shouted and Odysseus clicked the reins.

"Keep him still," he ordered Patroclus, "Mind his head."  
Suddenly Achilles started to mumble something, then leaned over the footplate and vomited onto the sand.  
"Achilles!" Patroclus cried.  
"Am I dead?" he asked, his voice clear.  
"No, you're not," Odysseus said firmly. "Far from it, old friend."  
"Good," Achilles answered and closed his eyes again. "I do not wish to die yet."

xXx

Zeus looked at him and rubbed his beard thoughtfully.  
"Oh, Achilles," he said. "What is this? What have you done?"  
Achilles tried to shrug, but the pain shot through his upper body into his neck, his brain.  
"Am I dead?"  
"Your mother did not go with you to the underworld, did not stop by the foul river Styx to have you destroy your mortal body falling off a wall," Zeus said scornfully. "This I will not allow."  
"Good," Achilles said. "I do not wish to die yet."  
"It will be painful," Zeus said. "I gave you the ability to heal but I did not take away the ability to hurt."  
Achilles closed his eyes.  
He knew that. It hurt already.

xXx

"Well, man, will he die?" Agamemnon cried.  
"I don't know," Phoenix replied.  
"You don't know?" bellowed the King of Kings, but King Phoenix remained calm, wiping his hands on a rag.

They stood outside Achilles' tent. The dawn was beginning to lighten the sky and around them, the Myrmidons sat or stood, anxiously watching the people coming and going through the leather curtain of the tent.  
"You have seen his leg, my lord. His skull has been cracked open, as far as I can see, and several ribs are broken. I don't know what damage has been done inside, I can only guess. He lies there, limp like a girl's doll. We will see if he survives the day and maybe tomorrow I can assess him better."

Phoenix folded the rag and handed it to his assistant. His slow, deliberate movements angered Agamemnon even more: he kicked a pot in rage. It shattered and the water it had held trickled away in the sand.  
"This vexes me!" he roared. "Those damned Trojans! He's my best bloody warrior!"

The curtain of the tent was shoved open and Menelaus joined them.  
"Is he awake?" Agamemnon asked his brother.  
"He's rambling, rambling about something. The milk of the poppy is working and his little woman is cleaning him. But it looks bad, brother. Odysseus says he will make a full recovery, but I have my doubts."  
"That's just _wonderful_ ," the Greek king spat sarcastically. "Tell the men to prepare for battle. I am absolutely certain that those bastard princes will use the opportunity to attack us, now that Achilles is laid low."  
He sighed theatrically and stomped off, his brother in tow.

Phoenix peered back inside the tent.  
Achilles lay on his low bed, moving his head slowly side to side, as if he were negating something in a silent conversation. The little dark-skinned woman was washing his arms gently and tenderly, crooning something to him in a language only she understood. The youth, Patroclus, was kneeling by the bed, stroking his cousin's bloodied hair back off his face.

And Odysseus was sitting on his heels in the corner, gnawing his knuckles. He looked up when he heard the rustle of the curtain, then stood and went outside.

"I have seen this man recover from injuries no mortal could – " he began but Phoenix held up a hand to silence him.  
"When you carried him off the chariot," the old king said, "I thought for sure he was dead. When he groaned and I realised he was alive, I assumed he had broken his neck or maybe his back."  
"And now?" the Ithacan king said.  
"Now I don't know," Phoenix replied. "I cannot tell."  
He patted Odysseus on the arm.  
"Maybe it is his time," Phoenix said. "Maybe he is preparing to meet the boatman, old friend."  
"No," he said, shaking his head. "No, he is not."  
He turned on his heel and headed back to the tent.  
"It is in the hands of the gods," Phoenix called.  
"And they can't have him," the king of Ithaca snapped.

xXx

Achilles could not open his eyes. The pain was too strong. His head ached, as though it were underneath a huge and heavy weight.  
He heard his name: "Achilles, my Achilles, _liji, liji,_ my boy, my boy – "  
It was Ahma.  
He could smell the spices on her fingers, the herbs she cooked with. She smeared something on his lips and he swallowed reflexively.  
"Go visit the gods," she whispered. "But come back, my prince."

xXx

Zeus regarded him with curiosity.  
"And if I let you live, will you go back to Phtia?" he asked.  
"No."  
"Will you attack Troy again?"  
"I will see Troy fall."  
"Ah, so a king's hubris is to be the foundation of this prince's immortality?"  
"You know my destiny better than anyone," Achilles said.  
"And where is the girl?"  
"The girl?"  
"The one you took with you from Kalios?"  
"I don't know," he said. "She's gone."  
"Wouldn't you heal better if she were with you?"  
"I let her go," he said.  
"That was foolish," Zeus said sadly.

xXx

Ahma was not pleased.

There was a constant stream of visitors in and out of the tent: silent Myrmidons, curious kings and generals, the light-eyed one, Eudorus, who stared at Achilles with almost fervent devotion, wordless and grim.  
Achilles was raving, his eyes closed, his head and lips moving silently, and she did not want anyone to see him like this.  
Patroclus she could stand: the boy was as worried as she, she saw that his eyes were glassy with tears and she squeezed his hand before wiping his face with a cool wet cloth. Startled, he let her do it, then she patted his hair and pushed him gently aside so she could wash Achilles' hair.

Then the curtain rose and fell again, and that white-haired friend of the little pig king entered, nodding and smiling. She glanced at him through narrowed eyes and returned to her work. She could not forbid them to enter, so she had to satisfy herself with glaring at them evilly, hoping they would take the hint and leave.

"Ah," Nestor said. "Ah, I see."  
Patroclus looked up.  
"He is in good hands, I see," Nestor said hastily. "Very good hands."  
He smiled at Ahma, but she turned her head to Patroclus so she could roll her eyes at him without being seen by the visitor.  
"Will he recover?" he asked, picking his words carefully.  
"Yes," Patroclus answered stoutly. "He just needs time to heal."  
"And where is the girl?"  
"The girl?"  
"The one you took with you from Kalios?"  
The boy looked at him, then looked away.  
"I don't know," Patroclus said softly. "She's gone."  
"But wouldn't he heal better if she were with him?" Nestor persisted.  
"I let her go," Achilles said, suddenly lucid.  
"Cousin!" gasped Patroclus, but the injured man's eyes rolled into the back of his head and he was gone.

"He needs rest!" Ahma cried, unable to stand it anymore.  
The two men jumped at the sound of her voice.  
"Go, go!" she said and whooshed Nestor out of the tent.  
"You," she said, pointing at Patroclus and then the low couch, "You sleep, boy. Sleep."  
He nodded and stretched out.  
She covered him with the cloth that red-haired woman had brought with her from her foreign land and left behind when she disappeared.

xXx

"But Hector will come," Zeus said. "He knows the camp is weak. If he has any sense – and the gods all know that he has a fine head on his shoulders – he will march down the beach and rout the Greeks off his sand."  
"But how can I fight? I cannot move."  
"Indeed."  
"I am vulnerable."  
"You are."  
Zeus smiled at him.  
"But you desecrated the temple of Apollo, Achilles, the patron of Troy. Did you think you would be immune to the Trojan arrows forever?"  
"No," he murmured.  
The pain in his head grew stronger and the father of the gods disappeared in shower of stars.

xXx

Nestor pointed towards Troy.  
"Yes, of course I think they will attack. They would be fools not to. Hector will come; he knows the camp is weak. If he has any sense – and the gods all know that he has a fine head on his shoulders – he will march down the beach and rout the Greeks off his sand."  
Odysseus tugged his beard as he did when he was thinking.  
"Then we need to move him," he said, nodding at the door of the tent.  
They were standing just outside and they could hear Achilles' low moans.  
"He is vulnerable," Nestor agreed.  
"Indeed."  
"But he can't be moved – and even if he could, then where?"  
"Onto the boat, my lord," Eudorus said. "If I may speak, my lord."

Nestor shook his head.  
"He can't be moved right now," he repeated. "The best we can do is hold them back till he's strong enough to be put on the boat. That way, if they do attack, you can at least retreat with him, Eudorus."  
Odysseus nodded his head reluctantly.  
"And the girl," Nestor began again. "It was the queen, wasn't it? The she-wolf?"

The Ithacan king glanced at Eudorus, then they nodded reluctantly.  
"What were you thinking?"  
"It was him," Odysseus said, jerking his thumb at the tent. "And he _wasn't_ thinking – you know Achilles, Nestor. In any case, it seems he got more than he bargained for and he let her go. No, I don't know where she is, before you ask."  
"Provided she hasn't already boarded a boat, she can't have gotten far, can she? We can check the neighbouring villages and find her, take her back. He seems to have taken a shine to her."  
"That's true," Odysseus said.  
"Then we'll find her," Nestor smiled. "How hard can it be to find a red-haired northerner on the beaches of Troy? And maybe some tender care from a pretty woman would help him back on his feet."  
"I don't think she was the tender, caring type," Eudorus remarked drily. "But it would please him if she were returned to him, I'm sure."

xXx

"And where is she now?" Achilles asked. "The woman, the she-wolf."  
"How would I know?" Zeus shrugged. "She is of other gods, the gods in the north, in the night-sky. She does not move in my domain."  
"How hard can it be to find a red-haired northerner on the beaches of Troy?"  
"Is she on the beaches of Troy?" Zeus pondered.  
"Where else could she be?"  
"On a boat to Carthage?"  
Achilles considered it.  
"Maybe," he admitted.

Zeus smiled at him.  
"Or maybe she is in Troy," the god said thoughtfully, playing with him.  
Achilles knew he was right; the White Queen was not in the realm of the Greek gods, but Achilles knew that Zeus could see her, no matter what he claimed.  
"She is in Troy," Achilles said and the thought crashed a bolt of pain across his consciousness. "The wolf is in the city."

xXx

Ahma lay a cold, wet cloth on his swollen shoulder.  
" _Liji, liji,_ " she whispered.  
He was her son, her sun, her yellow-haired boy, and his broken body was lying, bruised bloodied, at her fingertips.  
He opened his eyes again and looked at her.  
"She is in Troy," he said "The wolf is in the city."  
His eyes closed again and Ahma shuddered.


	25. 25

Hector looked around. Paris had the boy on his knee.  
Scamandrius was squealing in pleasure, pulling his uncle's curls. Helen clapped her hands in delight, her golden earrings jangling as she threw her head back and laughed. Even Andromache was laughing loudly, her mouth hidden by her hand, as was appropriate for a royal woman.

Before them was a table laden with fresh fruit and little cakes, and nearly dozen ladies-in-waiting stood around with cups and food in their hands, dressed in their finest white chitons. The women had obviously been celebrating Paris' victory and the man of the hour had decided to join them, in order to reap his laurels in the form of their adoration.

The laughter stopped when Hector came in.  
"Paris," he said calmly. "We need to prepare to attack."  
He smiled at them all, though he really felt like wringing his brother's neck.  
"If Achilles is dead, we must use their confusion to our advantage," Hector added as some of the women _aww_ -ed in disappointment.   
Paris, as ever, was the life and soul of every party, particularly one full of pretty women.

Behind him, Hector could almost sense the Kalion Queen stiffen.  
She'd followed him wordlessly, almost dazed, down the halls. He'd pointed out the courtyard, the entrance to the throne room, making polite conversation, but she'd looked at him blankly, her mind clearly elsewhere. Hector knew that she'd shared something with Achilles; his mention of the man's death had made her bristle, take a deep breath like she was about to be ducked underwater.

"If he's dead - ?" Paris cried jovially, handing the baby back to Andromache. "I'd certainly say he's dead!"  
Hector felt the pinch of a headache and avoided answering by smiling at the women assembled.  
"Leave us," he said to the head lady-in-waiting and she left, taking the other women with her.  
They filed past, mustering the strange woman who stood in his shadow in the doorway.

Hector led the red-haired woman out by the hand and presented her to his brother and the two women.  
"Why, that's the seer!" cried Paris.  
He looked slightly confused.  
Hector smiled at Relta.  
"You know my brother, my lady? Yes, well, Paris, this is the Queen – "  
"The former Queen," she murmured.  
"This is Relta, the former Queen of Kalios. This is Helen, the current Queen of Sparta, and my wife, Andromache, the future Queen of Troy."

The two women gasped and Andromache admonished him with a soft, " _Hector!_ "  
Her husband laughed his deep laugh.  
"I think there will be no secrets amongst us," he said. "Let us all know who we are and what we are. Paris, let's go."

Hector embraced Andromache, stroking her cheek tenderly, then bent to whisper in her ear.  
He scooped up a honey-cake from the table and left the room, followed by his brother, rushing to keep up.

xXx

"Find out what you can," Hector had whispered. "Everything you can."  
Andromache nodded, squeezed his hand.

She had heard about the Kalion Queen.  
It had been a _delicious_ piece of court gossip: King Kalii of Kalios, that rocky little kingdom down the coast, had already had one wife but she'd died of something unspectacular – a fever or ague – years before. That had allowed him pursue the one they'd called his real true love, a little Egyptian with slanted eyes and soft lips, one that wore robes as fine as any king.  
But what of it?  
Kalios had a brother and that brother had sons.

Then the mad king had actually allowed two witches into his court and – gods on high! - he'd _married_ one of them, a young one. A pregnant one!  
There had been much talk about it – could he father a child? Was it even his? They'd said that his new wife was significantly younger, barely twenty, and she was said to have a head of ghastly orange hair and skin so white it was like marble, covered in blue veins.

Andromache looked at the miserable woman in front of her and could attest to the fact that yes, she had that odd hair – but it was more copper than orange, almost streaked blond at the front from the Greek sun, and her skin was fantastically pale. When she looked up and straightened her back in an attempt at queenly stature, she noticed the former Queen's blue eyes, ringed with dark shadows.

So this was the she-wolf, the woman who rode into battle on a huge horse with a dozen dogs, to slay the enemies of Kalios?  
Andromache was disappointed. She'd expected something more ... well, more _formidable_.

"Take a seat," she said and she handed the little boy to his nursemaid before she sat down elegantly on a divan.  
Helen sat beside her, drawing a clear and unspoken line between the Trojan princes' women and the red-haired queen.  
Relta hesitated and sat opposite them, sitting demurely on the edge of the seat.

"Please," Andromache said. "Help yourself."  
She poured the woman a cup of sweetened wine and smiled at her.  
"Thank you, Lady Andromache," the Queen said.  
She spoke with the slightest of accents, like a musician hitting a chord incorrectly – the tiniest of intonation that gave her away.  
"If I may ask," Helen said, glancing at her sister-in-law, "How did you come to be here?" 

The White Queen turned to her, studied her for the briefest of moments before she said,  
"I was taken captive by the Greeks. Given to them by Nikephoras. Well, Damaris probably."  
She laughed drily, shaking her head.  
"She never particularly liked me," the white Queen said. "I think I was supposed to be tribute for Agamemnon."  
She smiled at the two women but the smile held no mirth.  
Andromache indicated the silver platters and the Queen leaned forward to take a slice of apple.

"Who took you?" Helen asked.  
Her voice sounded a little breathless.  
The Queen bit the apple and chewed, swallowed, buying time, before replying: "Odysseus. Achilles."  
Helen glanced at Andromache, her eyes bright.  
"Did they hand you over to my brother-in-law?"  
The woman across from them looked confused for a moment, then realised who they were talking about.  
"Agamemnon? No, no they didn't."  
"Why not?" Andromache wanted to know.

The White Queen looked at them, chewed her apple.  
Swallowed.  
"Achilles kept me for himself," she answered in a matter-of-fact voice but two spots of colour burned suddenly in her cheeks.

Helen said nothing, looked over at Andromache for help.  
"So his death must be ... of meaning to you," the older woman said, as kindly as she could.  
The Queen looked from one to the other on the divan opposite, then bowed her head for a second or two before looking up, looking at them squarely.  
"We were lovers," she said. "I did not want it at first, but it was ... he was kind. Then I asked to leave and he let me go."

Her voice was steady and clear.  
"Prince Hector seems like an honourable man," she said, inclining her head towards Andromache. "I have already told him that I will tell him the truth and he, in turn, promised to let me continue on my way home."  
"Are you sorry he has been slain?" asked Helen. "Achilles, I mean."  
Her face was openly curious.  
"I knew he was planning to climb the wall and I told him not to, but he would not listen. I knew he might die. I am sorry he did," the Queen said in a toneless voice.

She looked at them both emotionlessly, her face composed, but her long hands twisted the material of her robe into a tight knot in her lap. When she caught Andromache watching her, she immediately released the cloth, stretching her fingers out as though she were trying to keep a glaze of calm on her entire demeanour.

"He was a great warrior," Andromache said kindly.  
Relta held her gaze, her face pinched, the colour of her cheeks making two vivid spots in her ashen face.  
She cleared her throat and answered Andromache: "Yes, I believe so. He was very brave, very fearless. His men loved him dearly."  
"He is with Zeus now, no doubt celebrating his many victories with the gods."  
The red-haired woman nodded, smiled her mirthless smile.  
"No doubt," she said, her voice hoarse.

xXx

So he was dead. The golden one in the black armour.  
Relta nodded as Andromache spoke, but her mind was over the walls of Troy, down by its sandy shore. Every time she blinked, his face flashed in front of his eyes.

How could he be dead?  
How many days ago since she'd lain with him? Not many. Two? Three?

She'd woken to his leg pressing between hers.

"No, Achilles, no," she said, putting her hands over her face. "Go away, you pest. Go and fight someone."  
He laughed.  
She peeked through her fingers; he was balanced over her on his forearms, his nose brushing hers. He wasn't wearing any clothes, she could smell his skin, the musky smell of his sweat, and she shook her head again as he pressed his knee, trying to part her legs.

"Achilles," she said, unable to stop herself laughing, "Could you possibly leave me alone? Let me sleep?"  
"You sleep too much," he grumbled, "There are more interesting things to do in this bed."  
His blue eyes were crinkled with fun and he shook his head over her face so his braids fell into her eyes.  
"We've done them all, you scourge," she said and allowed her legs to be pushed apart.

"Enough sleeping," he said. "Why do you need to sleep so much, anyway?"  
He rolled over so he was beside her, pulled her robe up to her waist, up over her breasts.  
"Because this country is too damned hot," Relta sighed.  
"And your country isn't?" he asked, pretending to be busy stroking her nipple.  
She had steadfastly refused to tell him about her family, her country, her life with the king. Now, when he asked, he did so casually. Stealthily.

She stroked his blond head, pushed a strand of hair behind his ear. She couldn't answer, overcome by a sudden wave of homesickness.

"It's cold and dark and rainy and beautiful," she said wistfully. "The sky is wider and the clouds are bigger. Danu's power is everywhere, in everything: the mountains, the winds, the rivers and ... and the sea."  
Oh, the _sea_.  
"Who is Danu?"  
"The goddess, the all-powerful."  
"A woman?" Achilles said, raising an eyebrow.  
"She would beat your Zeus with a snap of her fingers," Relta said and yanked one of his braids playfully.

"Why do you miss the sea? We have a sea in Greece," Achilles grinned, tracing a finger down her stomach. "Lots of sea. Sea everywhere."  
"You have a pretty blue sea," she replied mockingly. "Like your pretty blue eyes. We have a big, grey sea with angry waves, full of sea creatures with big teeth and whiskers that bite – "  
She leaned over and nipped his shoulder. He yelped but he didn't remove his finger.

"And it's fierce, Achilles. Our sea is _fierce_ ," she said, as his fingers tiptoed downwards. "The rivers run freely, not pathetic little trickles in the bottom of dry riverbeds. At night we lie under thick woollen blankets, not this scratchy linen, and we sleep well, not tossing and turning and sweating and groaning. Oh, and we wear beautiful furs, not this stinking wolf – "  
"In fairness," he said, dipping his fingers between her legs. "Only you wear the stinking wolf. And if you have become the Wolf Queen, then there is no one to blame for it but you."  
His fingertips moved gently.

She put her balled fist in her mouth, screwing her eyes shut.  
"You nuisance," she whispered and he stroked gently, kissing her collar bone.  
She writhed beneath him, breathing quickly.  
Achilles moved above her, positioned himself to push inside her.

"I will get you beautiful furs," he promised, kissing the tip of her nose. "And make you a palace of marble that's even cold enough for your icy blood."  
Her eyes shot open and she stared at him as he moved gently between her legs. He grinned at her in return, his broad, handsome smile, and lowered his head to kiss her neck.

And Relta had felt a wave of – what? Affection? Pity? Regret?  
She didn't know.  
She'd spontaneously grabbed his blond head and pulled him close, kissing his hair, the rough stubble on his cheek, digging her fingers into his back to hug him tighter.  
_This is all wrong_ , she thought, even as she pulled him close. _All wrong._  
Delighted, he'd kissed her enthusiastically in return, and she'd had to try hard not to cry.


	26. 26

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading, thanks for your comments!

"No," said King Priam thoughtfully. "We will not attack."  
Hector hissed the air through his teeth.

The council gathered around the long pool looked equally surprised.  
"This is Paris' victory," Priam said, his watery blue eyes surveying the men around him. "We can take a day or two to celebrate such a magnificent victory over our enemies. Achilles will still be dead, three moons from now."  
"Achilles might not be dead even now," Hector said through gritted teeth, every fibre of his body straining to be calm.  
"Paris said he is," Priam replied, narrowing his eyes for a split second at his son.  
"But father – "  
"This is my decision," the Trojan king said, cutting him off. "Lyros, you may check the kitchens and wine cellars and tell me what provisions we have to offer the good people of Troy."

Priam smiled regally and nodded his dismissal at the councillors and they left, glancing at Hector and Paris nervously as they did.

"My son," Priam said, putting an arm around Paris' shoulders, "you are to be the hero of the day. I would like you to go to your Helen and make sure your finest armour is polished and buffed. You must look like a god before your people. They owe you a debt."

Hector balled his fists till he could even feel his closely-trimmed fingernails digging into the flesh of his palms. Paris beamed and kissed his father's hand, clapping Hector on the shoulder before he turned and left.

Hector waited till his little brother had left the chamber, then turned to the king with an agonised,  
" _Father!_ "  
"What?" Priam answered insouciantly. "Will you begrudge your little brother his day in the sun?"  
"Father, we do not know for sure the man is dead. The Greeks were running back and forth at the base of the wall, there was no body there the next morning – "  
"Maybe they took it. For the funeral rites."  
"No pyre has burned on the beach, father."  
"Maybe the body is being sent to Phtia to be burned near his ancestors."  
"My king," Hector said urgently. "Achilles is not dead. But he has been injured, this much I am willing to stake my life on. Why are we not striking now, when they are at a disadvantage?"

Priam looked at him, placed a hand on his older son's shoulder.  
"Sometimes the biggest step forward seems a small step backwards," he said. "Our people are sick of defeat, Hector. Do you know what they need, more than anything else? A victory! A feast, a parade, a day of celebration. I cannot send the men out, even if Achilles is dead or lying snapped in two, because this evening, the funeral pyres will burn again and they cannot stand it anymore."

He looked at his son sharply.  
"Three years, my Hector," he said. "Three years! I cannot smell burning flesh any longer. It hangs in every corner, every crack, and I smell it in my dreams. Let Paris have his victory, let him for once stand clear of your shadow and be applauded for his bravery. Let the people thank the gods and feast on what little we can scrape together. They will fight with renewed vigour, strengthened by this celebration of Trojan might."

"And if Achilles is not dead?" Hector wanted to know.  
Priam sighed.  
"Then we will cross that bridge when we come to it," he said.

He put an arm around his son's shoulders.  
"But you said you had something else to tell me?" asked Priam.  
Hector tried to pull himself together, tried to gather his thoughts.  
"Yes, father," he replied. "We have a visitor. An esteemed visitor, no less. The former Queen of Kalios, the one they call the She-Wolf. She escaped the Greeks and was brought here by some villagers. She might have some information that may be useful to us when we attack."

He couldn't help but emphasise the _when_.  
Priam smiled at him.  
"Now that's a sign to proceed with care if ever I heard one," he smiled at his son. "Apollo has sent us a messenger with inside information about our enemy. See, my son? The gods smile in our favour."

Hector, too, tried to smile, but twisting his mouth also twisted his gut.  
His father returned to his throne and while his son ordered one of the guards to bring the northern woman down to meet the King of Troy.

xXx

Agamemnon pulled the chicken meat from the bone and ate it noisily.  
He did not offer any to Odysseus; but then, he had not offered him a drink or a seat either.  
"Those Trojan _bastards_ ," was all he said, before he threw the bone down with a clatter and wiped the grease on his embroidered robe before reaching for more chicken.  
"Aye," Odysseus agreed.  
"Celebrating! _Celebrating!_ "

He thought it prudent to say as little as possible: Agamemnon had been dining alone, not even in the humour to endure his brother's company, when he had sent for Odysseus.  
The Ithacan had been hunched in the sand outside Achilles' tent at dusk, talking to some of the Myrmidons in low whispers when the messenger came; they, like all the men in the camp, were in their armour, ready for a battle that was evidently not going to come. On the wind they occasionally caught the faint sound of music or cheers, and all along the Trojan walls they saw the blaze of torches, burning jauntily to mock Agamemnon.

"Is there any improvement?" Agamemnon growled.  
"He grows stronger by the hour," lied Odysseus smoothly.

Achilles lay on his bed, his ribcage bound in white as though they had started to prepare him for burial. His blond hair had been hacked off on Phoenix' orders so they could keep an eye on the gash on his head, to make sure it didn't become infected. And his leg was bound tightly in a splint, which Odysseus covered with a linen cloth when he visited: whenever he saw the limb, he had a sickening vision of the bone protruding from the flesh. The Myrmidon's face was sallow, his skin had lost its golden hue. Now it just looked tarnished, yellow, his skin stretched over his cheekbones and his lips cracked and dry.  
Odysseus knew his friend could – should – heal, but at this point in time, Achilles looked like he'd been laid out for his own pyre.

"We need to get him on a ship to Phtia," Agamemnon growled. "He's affecting morale. If he'd had the good sense to just _die_ and get it over with, we could've sent him off to the gods with a bang and riled the men up to seek his revenge. But _this_? He's just hanging around, like a damned wraith. He looks like _shit_ , that's what he looks like."

The Ithacan king drew a breath, bit his tongue.  
"Aye, it's true, he does not look well," he said as evenly as he could.

Agamemnon pushed the plate away angrily and it fell to the floor with a clatter. Two serving girls rushed forward to clean it up.  
Looking down at them, the king of kings snapped, "And where is his woman?"  
"She is by his side every second of the day," Odysseus said with a placating smile. "Never has a man had a more devoted nursemaid."  
"No, no, not the savage little Abyssinian. The slave girl. The one that had him so jolly for a while. Where is she? Why is she not tending him? Nothing cheers a man like a pretty girl at his side."  
"He let her go," Odysseus said.

With the tip of his toe, he pushed one of the bones over to the serving girl closest to him. She glanced up at him gratefully and gathered it on the tray.

"Well, go to the slave quarters and get him a new one," Agamemnon announced with a generous wave. "No, wait, I'll pick him out one. There's a sweet little thing from Thrace that might make a good nurse – and if we still don't see an improvement in the next three days, it's on a boat to Phtia he'll be."  
"I don't think he wants or needs a pretty little slave girl right now," Odysseus said, "But on his behalf I thank you."  
"Why not?" the Achaean king said. "He was happy enough with the others I sent."

He sat back on his throne and clicked his fingers.  
One of the women rushed forward with a wet cloth and dabbed his face. Agamemnon grabbed her wrist and twisted it until she mewled in pain and sat, reluctantly, on his lap.  
"What others?" Odysseus asked, trying not to look as the king tried to wriggle his fingers under the girl's robe.  
"All of them. Well, most of them. I picked him out some good breeders, you know. Not that it did any use. That man – it's like the gods gave him the ability to plough the field, but not plant the seed. You know what I mean?"  
He leered at the man before him.  
Odysseus felt his chest tighten.  
"I do not, my king."

Agamemnon grinned, his eyes closing to little slits above his reddened cheeks, rubbed shiny by the slave girl's cloth.  
"The great warrior has no issue, Odysseus. Have you never wondered about that? He has sired no children. No little Myrmidon bastards running about the camp, swinging little swords and causing little chaos. Why is that?"  
Odysseus had no answer.  
"And I thought to myself ... I said, _Agamemnon, you will never call this man to heel. This is the dog that will never be trained._ But his offspring?..."

He looked up at Odysseus and smirked in satisfaction.  
" _If any of my slave girls bear his child_ , I thought, _then the child is mine_. The progeny of Achilles? A warrior in the making - and what care I if it's a bastard son of a slave whore? I want a man to swing a sword for me and if I can get him early enough, I can train the pup where I could not train the dog."

Odysseus could not find the words.  
"So," Agamemnon continued, "I sent some fine women this way and, by all the gods in the firmament above us, he fucked them all and fucked them often. But not one single child. Not _one_!"  
He pinched the girl and she yelped.  
"It sounds like you sent him out to stud," Odysseus said in a low voice.  
"Oh, that I did," agreed Agamemnon equably. "For all the good it did me."  
He spat on the floor.  
"The gods blessed him in every way but one."  
Odysseus breathed deeply.

The king of kings grinned again at the Ithacan.  
"And that knowledge is what has prevented me from smashing that cur's head in, time and time again. I have put up with his insult, with his insolence, because I need his sword. But every time he looks me up and down, mocks me with his handsome face, I have looked at him and I have thought, _You are not a man. You have no sons and you will never have_."

He pushed the girl off his knee, slapping her rump hard as she hopped up.  
"What do you think of that, my good Odysseus?"  
Odysseus took another breath. It was at times like this that he thought of his wife, Penelope.  
_Be circumspect,_ she would warn, _choose your next words carefully._  
"Hmm," he said finally.

Agamemnon frowned, unhappy at not getting the reaction that he wanted.

"Give him three days – let it not be said that I am not magnanimous. Then put him back on a boat to Phtia and out of my sight," he snapped. "And send me the slave girl he was finished with. I'd like to see for myself what got Achilles so excited for a while."  
"I told you," Odysseus said, "He let her go. Not back to the slave quarters; he freed her."  
"Well, damn him again," said Agamemnon. "Who was she? What tricks did she have up her sleeve – between her legs – to make the Myrmidon hop?"

 _No, Odysseus_ , Penelope would beg. Be prudent, my love. Be circumspect. Be discreet.

 _Aye, to hell with that,_ he thought. He drew himself up and looked Agamemnon in the eye.

"It was the Kalion queen," Odysseus said. "The she-wolf. He smuggled her back to Troy and bedded her every chance he could. I haven't seen him as satisfied with a woman since ... oh, since _ever_."  
He sneered at the fat man in front of him, and then rearranged his features into a neutral smile as a dull red colour crept up the king's neck.

Agamemnon spluttered.  
"I told him she was mine!" he roared. "You were given orders to bring her back to _me!_ "  
"And you gave him the chest she was smuggled in, so she is his tribute. Achilles claimed her fairly."

Odysseus bowed his head.  
"Not that it matters, but we have sent out men to find her, king of kings. I fear it may be in vain, but the Myrmidons think he will heal faster if he has his woman, so there are scouts in the outlying villages trying to track where she went."  
"If they find her – _when_ they find her – " Agamemnon began.  
"If they find her – _when_ they find her –" Odysseus said, "she will be returned to Achilles and there will be a mutiny if she is not. Of this I warn you now, king of kings. And though the Trojans are celebrating at the moment, it's only a matter of time before they use the opportunity to cut us while we are weak."

He bowed low.  
"Thank you for the invitation, my king," said Odysseus and left the tent as quickly as he could.

xXx


	27. 27

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A three-chapter update - I hope that keeps you going for a while. Check back in at the end of the week for the next instalment.

"You are by far the nicest gaoler I have ever had," Relta teased and she was rewarded with one of Andromache's radiant smiles.  
"Have you had so many?" Hector's wife answered, pouring her some wine.  
Relta winced. "You'd be surprised," she answered wryly.

Andromache glanced up at her and handed her a cup.  
While the city of Troy celebrated Achilles' defeat at the end of Paris' arrow, Relta had been deposited in Andromache's chamber and Hector's wife had firmly closed the door behind them. She'd patted the divan next to her and placed her little boy on Relta's knee while she fetched wine and fruit from the table at the end of the room.

"Won't you be missed?" Relta had asked.  
"Hector will say that Scamandrius has a fever," Andromache replied, nodding at the little boy. "I doubt that I will be very much missed in the midst of all the toasts and speeches to Paris' honour."

Her voice held a note of bitterness as she continued: "I can't recall my father-in-law ever throwing a feast to celebrate my husband's many victories. But Paris kills one man, one devil, and the whole city must rejoice."  
She clapped a hand over her mouth in horror.  
"I'm so sorry," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "Please forgive me, my lady. I don't know what came over me."  
"Do not trouble yourself, my lady," Relta said, releasing the little boy, who wriggled off her lap to grab some grapes. 

Andromache looked at her gratefully.  
"I love Priam, with all my heart. But when it comes to Paris, he has a blindness. It will be the death of my Hector, I am sure."  
"I hope not," Relta replied. "Your husband is a good man."  
And Andromache gave her another smile, albeit a watery one.  
"He is," she replied. "He is an honourable man, a far better opponent than Agamemnon deserves."  
"That was evident the second I met him."

The Trojan princess sat down, arranging her robes around her.  
"And Achilles? Did you find him honourable?"  
Relta looked at her, tried not to freeze.  
Every time Andromache mentioned him, she felt her skeleton stiffen, as though the other woman had touched an open nerve on her spine.

"He was honourable," she replied carefully. "In his own way. But I did not get to know him well."  
"I thought you were lovers?"  
"Yes."  
She could not say more.  
Hector's wife looked at her curiously, then leaned forward a little.  
"My mother always said that you learned the measure of a man on the pillow," she said softly.  
Relta swallowed.  
"I thought I could read him," she said truthfully, "But I'm not sure I ever really could."  
For the blink of an eye, she saw his sleeping face, hair falling over his forehead, his body moving softly with each breath.

Andromache nodded.  
"Perhaps because he is of the gods," she said, nodding wisely.  
"Oh, he's not immortal," Relta shook her head. "He bleeds like other men. It's just that ... he heals. It's as though the gods gave him that body to send men to Hades, and they tend to it like any warrior minds and mends his weapon."  
Andromache's narrow face crumpled in distress.  
"So if Hector is right and Paris hasn't killed him, you think he will recover?"  
"If he is not dead, he will definitely recover," Relta said. "But who could survive a fall from that wall?"

Andromache shook her head.  
"Do you not wish to know?" she cried. "You shared a bed. Do you not hope that he is still alive?"  
_Golden skin. Warm breath on her jaw as he moved inside her. The soft sound he made when he came._  
She swallowed.  
"I had to choose," Relta said dully. "I have a daughter. She's not even ten. They let her leave Kalios with my husband's man and they're waiting for me in Carthage. How could I think of staying with Achilles when my child is waiting for me across the sea?"

She bit her lower lip so hard that she tasted blood.  
Andromache nodded and took her hand.  
"I understand," she said.

xXx

"They are looking for her," Lysander muttered into Hector's ear.  
Hector nodded, smiled, pretended to listen to Aeneas.  
As soon as he could, he excused himself from the banquet table and hurried outside, where Lysander stood in the shadows behind a large column, his helmet under his arm.

"Tell me all, Lysander," Hector said.  
His captain glanced around.  
"The men who brought her here said the warrior that gave them money for her passage came back to find her this morning. They told him that she'd gotten away and he became quite angry. As soon as he'd left, they hurried to tell me."  
"Why did he want her back?"  
"He did not say."  
"Either Agamemnon has heard of her escape or Achilles wants her," Hector said thoughtfully.  
He paced back and forth.

Lysander looked at him curiously.  
"What are you thinking, my lord?"  
"I have a feeling that Achilles yet lives. I would almost stake my life on it. And for whatever reason, he wants the woman back – or perhaps his friends want her back for him. Either way, we have something the Greeks want."  
"Something else," Lysander corrected.

Hector laughed drily.  
"Yes, we are slowly accumulating woman that the Greeks desperately desire."  
He chewed the corner of his thumbnail, thinking it over.  
"I promised to let her leave," he said. "But perhaps she could be persuaded to do us a small favour before she does."  
"How will you do that, my prince?"  
"I can do something she wants, and she can do something I want," Hector said. "A straightforward exchange."  
"You want her to kill Achilles?" Lysander asked.  
Hector shook his head.  
"No," he answered. "I want her to kill Agamemnon."

xXx

The sounds of the banquet had faded.  
There was an occasional drunk chorus as some of the last revellers made their way home on the street below Andromache's chambers, but for the most part, the music and euphoric cheering that had punctuated the entire day had slowly come to an end.

Hector sat opposite her, upright and calm.  
Relta found his presence slightly intimidating: she felt the desire to sit up straighter, fold her hands more neatly. The Trojan prince was kindly but solemn, enquiring politely about her well-being and apologising for keeping her cooped up all day.

"It's just that we had to -"  
"Figure out what to do with me," she'd finished and smiled at him. "But I think you agreed to let me go on my way?"

Hector cleared his throat.  
"Achilles is alive," he said.  
There it was again; the ice that dropped down her back, freezing her.  
The Trojan prince inclined his head a fraction, looked at her closely before continuing:  
"I know this because there has been no pyre lit, there has been no word from our spies that he has been laid out. Instead, they say the kings are agitated; there is much activity in Agamemnon's tent. They're probably deciding what to do."

He nodded at her.  
"So I'd like you to go back to him," he said and smiled, a smile that did not reach his brown eyes.  
"My lord!" she cried, shocked.  
"Hear me out," he said, raising a hand. "They're looking for you, the Achaeans. There are reports coming in that the villages have been visited by men in grey armour – "  
"Ithacans," she said hoarsely. "They're the Ithacans. Odysseus' men."  
"- Ithacans, looking for you. Why Ithacans?"  
"The king of Ithaca is his friend," she said, looking down at her hands.

She felt a weight descend on her shoulders.  
"Well, I want you to go back to him. Say you have returned to tend to him, heal him, whatever it is a seer does."  
"I have no talent with herbs or potions," Relta scoffed. "My tending would only speed him on his way to the afterworld."  
Hector laughed out loud.  
"Well, your being there might just be enough," he said.

"Why?" she said, her face serious. "Why should I, Prince Hector? You promised to let me continue on my journey. Why do you think I would go back?"  
Hector stretched his fingers, cracking his knuckles, and she winced at the sound.  
"My wife has told me about your child," he said.  
She flinched and the Trojan nodded.  
"So I have an offer for you, Queen Relta. Go back to the Greeks," he said slowly. "And if you kill Agamemnon, I will put you on a boat to Carthage to pick up your daughter, and that boat will take you to very edge of the world if that is where you want to go."

There was a ringing in her ears.  
" _Kill_ Agamemnon?"  
"Stab him. Poison him. Slit his throat," Hector said, shrugging. "I really don't care. Kill Agamemnon and the fastest ship in our fleet will be yours to command. This I promise you on my honour as a prince of Troy."  
"I can't kill Agamemnon," she said, feeling a bubble of nervous laughter rise up in her throat.  
"Why not?"  
"I've never killed anyone."  
"The legends say you rode into battle on a magnificent horse and slaughtered a dozen Phoenicians."  
"They're _legends_ ," she said. "If I were capable of killing anyone, Achilles' body would be ash on the Trojan sand by now."

Hector stood up.  
"You have a night to think on it," he said. "If you don't want to, you can walk out the gate tomorrow and make your way, unharmed, to wherever you want to go. I will not stop you, but I also will not help you."

He looked at her, and his handsome face was grave.  
"If you agree, we will see that you are returned to the Achaean camp immediately. You can tell them that you heard that Achilles had been injured and you had a change of heart. Your loving feelings for him overwhelmed you and you felt compelled to return to his side."  
She rolled her eyes, but Hector just smiled at her.  
"White Queen," he chided, "She-wolf of Kalios, I know you say you have no regard for the man, but every time I say his name, you stop breathing for a second or two."

He stood up.  
"So maybe it will not be that hard to fake concern and affection for your fallen hero. And as soon as the opportunity arises, you will kill Agamemnon and end this damned war."  
"I don't understand: why don't you want me to kill Achilles?"  
Hector shrugged.  
"If you want to kill a snake, you chop off its head," he said. "Killing Achilles would shorten the war, but I want to finish it. Let him live – as long as he goes back to Phtia and takes his damned Myrmidons with him, he can live to be a hundred as far as I'm concerned."

Relta stood up to, faced Hector and tipped her head to one side, trying to gauge the seriousness of his offer.

"And if I don't kill the king of kings?"  
"I have men on that beach," Hector said. "They cannot kill a mighty warrior like Achilles or a powerful king like Agamemnon, but a small woman like you?"  
He cracked his knuckles again and, again, she winced.

"Think it over, your majesty," he said. "We'll talk in the morning."


	28. 28

Hector left her alone with her thoughts in a small locked chamber for a full day.  
No one came near her, except servants with warm water for washing and warm food to eat. She'd spent the day looking through the metal latticework affixed to the large windows, watching the people on the street below. The window faced the city, not the beach, so she couldn't see the sea or the smoke from the fires of the Trojan camp.

Andromache and Helen came to sup with her in the evening, but neither stayed long. She asked them about Hector, but they both looked uneasy – Andromache answered that he had been occupied all day with matters of state. Relta knew she was lying, but didn't think it worth the effort to challenge her. She knew he was letting her dangle, letting her stew, so all she could do was wait.

And when he rapped on the door on the morning of the second day, she was sitting on the edge of the small bed they had put against the wall for her to sleep on, waiting for him.  
"I'm sorry," he apologised, spreading his hands in a gesture of supplication. "I had a lot of business to attend to."  
"You're not sorry," Relta replied. "You left me by myself on purpose. To show me how dependent I am on your good will."  
Hector beamed at her good-naturedly, chuckling as though he'd been caught at a prank.  
"Did it work?" he asked.

She glared at him.  
"Prince Hector," she replied. "I have nothing. Not a single coin, not my stones, not my bag. I have nothing but your good will."  
"So I take it that's a yes then, is it?"  
"Yes," she said. "Yes, I will go back to the Achaeans and yes, I will kill Agamemnon. Give me a poison: I don't intend to get close enough to his neck to slit it."  
Hector nodded and pulled something out from behind his back: it was her pouch.  
She grabbed it, reached inside to check that everything was there.  
"It's all there except the money," he said when she looked up at him questioningly. "I've kept that somewhere safe for you; you can have it back when you come back to me. In the meantime, let's practise what you're going to tell the Greeks when you re-appear on the beach."

He sat down on a chair opposite the cot and made her recite her lines.

xXx

And then she walked back over the dunes, as though she'd never been away.

Timon and Eudorus were hunched over the campfire, warming up a broth.  
The day was overcast and it had rained all morning, torrential rain that had come and gone, leaving heavy clouds in its wake. The weather seemed ominous, like the mood of the camp. They sat on their heels, neither speaking, each deep in his own thoughts. Then Eudorus looked up at the woman approaching them, recognising her gait. She pulled back the cloth that covered her hair and he saw it was her, the She-Wolf, the White Queen, her robe sopping wet from the rain.  
"He is alive?" she said.  
It was a question, not a statement.

Timon and Eudorus looked at her in astonishment.  
"Yes, my lady," Timon stammered.  
She surveyed the beach coolly, biting her lower lip in thought. Most people were inside their tents or under the canopies erected before them, wrapped up against the damp.  
"I thought so," she said finally. "His ship is still here."  
She drew in a breath.  
"I suppose I should go to him, then," she said to no one in particular and turned to leave.  
Eudorus glanced at Timon, who looked at him, slack-jawed.  
Then they scrambled to their feet and ran after her.

xXx

"Where were you?" Odysseus asked.

He stood before the entrance to Achilles' tent, like his gatekeeper. The door was covered with a heavy black canvas, not the leather strips that had served as the curtain-like door when she'd been there.  
The Ithacan looked deeply suspicious and Relta didn't blame him.  
"I went to a village on the shore and paid for passage to the mainland," she said in a calm voice. "But they were convinced I was a runaway slave, so they stole my money and marched me off to Troy."  
"To Troy? Inside the city?"  
"Yes," she replied, the words tripping easily off her tongue. She had practised with Hector and the lies just flew out of her mouth. "They brought me to the captain of the guard – "  
"Lysander?"  
"A dark-haired man? Yes, I think so. But he was distracted by other things, so he just ordered me thrown in gaol."  
"And how did you escape the dungeons of Troy, my lady?" Odysseus asked sardonically. "Your witching powers?"  
"I didn't escape, my lord," she answered in the same sardonic tone. "King Priam ordered the release of all the women and children in the prisons as an act of mercy to celebrate Achilles' death. I found myself back out on the street with a bunch of ragamuffins and petty thieves, so I took off as fast as I could."  
"Back here," stated Odysseus. "Back to Agamemnon's camp."  
"Where else could I go?" she answered, not trying to hide the annoyance in her voice. "They took my money, they took my things. How do you think I'm going to get to the mainland? Swim?"

Relta raised her hands to show Odysseus that she was carrying nothing. She had buried her pouch next to a scrubby bush a little way off the road to Troy. She hoped it would still be there when she went to dig it up.

Eudorus leaned over.  
"She walked here, my lord. Alone. Some of the slave women reported seeing her on the road to the camp by herself."  
Odysseus looked her up and down.  
"Why did you return if you thought Achilles was dead?" he asked.  
"I didn't think he was dead," she lied. "I have seen his wounds heal. I knew he was still alive. And he is, isn't he?"  
The king of Ithaca tugged his beard, then seemed to relent.  
"Yes," he admitted. "He's alive. But – but he's not ... he's not the way you left him. His injuries are bad."

She set her jaw.  
"Show me," she said.

xXx

"Gods in the firmament," she hissed.  
Achilles' tent was as dark as night, it reeked of herbs and incense, and it was full of people.  
She couldn't tell how many, she could make out some shadowy figures but it seemed crowded. Underneath the heavy smell from the burner, she smelled sweat and that unpleasant smell of death. She blinked rapidly as her eyes ran with tears, reacting to the smoke and the strong smells. Odysseus gave her a tiny push into the room and she moved forward, her hands outstretched.

"Queen?" said a familiar voice and she looked down.  
It was Ahma.  
"My lady!"  
Patroclus. He grabbed her hand and pumped it enthusiastically.  
Two of the shadowy figures now were identified

"Queen of Kalios? I am Phoenix," said a third and a craggy face emerged out of the gloom. "I am tending Achilles. This is Aito, my assistant and this is - "  
"Where is he?" she asked.  
They'd moved the furniture around; his bed was no longer where it had been and she couldn't see him.  
"Here," Phoenix said and took her elbow.  
She resisted the urge to shake him off, allowed him to lead her a few steps to where someone lay on some sort of a stretcher on the floor.

She drew in a ragged breath and knelt quickly.  
"He has some broken ribs and of course a broken leg... the wound on his head is healing, but it is weeping still and that worries me. And the shoulder. That's compounded by an old wound – the little woman said you sewed it, is that right?"  
Relta ignored him, her breath coming and going in rapid tiny gasps, as though she were drowning.  
Achilles lay, still as death. His long hair had been hacked back; now it was only a thumb's length in some places, sticking up raggedly around his face.  
Oh, his face.  
The skin was stretched across the bones, his face looked like a funeral mask.

"... and the men said that you are a wit – a healer of sorts? That you have some powers?"  
"I have no powers," she hissed, standing up. "I am not a witch and I am not a healer. Why is he not healing? He can recover from anything."  
"We have been giving him the milk of the poppy," Phoenix said. "He was raving, talking out loud, saying bizarre things. It frightened the men. We thought it best to ... put him to sleep till he started to heal."  
"Started to heal?" she repeated. "How can he heal if you have drugged him? And what's that stench?"  
"They are herbs," Phoenix said smoothly. "Offerings to Zeus for his full recovery."

Relta felt a red wrath rise in her. Stars exploded in front of her eyes.  
"Fuck Zeus," she spat.  
In the darkness there were shocked gasps.  
"Oh, no," said Phoenix.  
"Fuck you, Zeus," she raged into the darkness. "Fuck you! Either take him and let him die, or let him heal. What is this? What is this?"  
There was no answer, from either mortal or immortal source.  
Then Phoenix ventured carefully, "He is healing, my lady."  
"Not fast enough," she snapped. "He looks like death. He smells like death."  
She pushed Achilles with her toe.  
"Well?" she said to the body on the floor. "What are you waiting for, man? You've slept long enough. Wake up."  
"My lady – " Phoenix began, worried, and reached out to touch her but she shoved his hand away.

She pushed past Odysseus to the door of the tent and grabbed the heavy canvas. With both hands she ripped it down, enjoying the satisfaction of hearing it tear. She grabbed a handful of leather strips and knotted them, letting the dim light of the day pour into the tent. Ignoring the protests, she pushed Phoenix' assistants aside and scooped up a handful of sand to put bury the incense burning in the little copper bowl. It hissed and she tipped it over, not minding that the hot bowl burned her fingertips.

"Get out," she ordered. "All of you except for Ahma, get out. Eudorus, Timon, Patroclus stay nearby. The rest of you get out. Out!"

The men looked at each other warily, then reluctantly left the tent.  
She knelt beside Achilles again. In natural light she saw the yellow tone his skin had taken on, sallow like bracken water; she gently examined the cut on his head. The sight of it made her stomach turn, but she recognised it had been well cared for. She brushed his hair aside, in places shorn short to allow them to tend the wound.  
His eyes were shut, but she could see his pupils moving beneath the lids. Was he dreaming?  
She stroked his cheek tenderly. His lips were cracked and dry.  
"Ahma," she said and pointed at his mouth.  
The old woman understood and brought her some jars of unguents. Relta opened one or two, found a grease that had been infused with herbs and rubbed it gently across his lips.

"Achilles," she said clearly. "Achilles, it's time to wake up."  
His pupils fluttered, she saw them move beneath the near-translucent skin of his lids.  
"Achilles," she ordered. "Wake up."  
His lips parted.  
Behind her Ahma gasped.  
She tried again.  
"Achilles," she said. "Come back."  
His eyes shot open. Relta held her breath.  
He stared at the ceiling above him, breathing deeply, raggedly.  
"Yes," he said.  
Ahma sank to her knees beside his body, put a small dark hand on his ribs.

"You're back," Relta said, taking his hand. "Now stay here."  
"You're back," he repeated, turning to look at her. "Now stay here."  
Then his lips moved, formed the ghost of a smile.

xXx

Zeus had cared for him well.  
So well, in fact, that Achilles had considered taking his place among the residents of Olympus. Why engage in mortal battles when surely the gods would provide more stimulating challenges?

"I will keep you here," Zeus said thoughtfully. "Thetis would wish it, I'm sure."  
Achilles grinned. His mother did not trust Zeus and his tricks: he was quite certain she would not wish it at all.  
"Oh, no," said Zeus suddenly, and Achilles could tell by his voice that he was not happy.

The White Queen stood among them, her copper hair a discordant note of fury among the white columns of Mount Olympus.  
"Fuck you, Zeus," she shouted at the god. "Fuck you! Either take him and let him die, or let him heal. What is this? What is this?"  
"He is healing," Zeus said and it seemed to Achilles that he sounded a little defensive.  
"Not fast enough," she countered. "He looks like death. He smells like death."  
"The mortals have put him to sleep with the milk of poppy," Zeus said. "They give him no food, no sustenance, no air, no sunshine. It's not my fault that he looks like a corpse. I, for my part, have been looking after him very well."

The White Queen turned to Achilles and she kicked him – kicked him! – with her foot.  
"Well?" she said to him. "What are you waiting for, man? You've slept long enough. Wake up."  
Achilles looked to Zeus.  
"I thought you said she was not of your realm?" he said. "How is she here?"  
Zeus shrugged.  
"She walks in two realms," he replied. "These mortals I cannot control. If she comes for you, you must go."  
Ignoring Zeus she brushed his lips with hers and said,  
"Wake up, Achilles. Come back."  
The god sighed.  
"Oh, very well, then," he said, resigned. "You can have him back. Go on, then, lad. Off you go."

Achilles opened his eyes.  
"You're back," Relta said, taking his hand. "Now stay here."  
His head hurt, a crushing pain that made him struggled to keep his eyes open. He tried to focus on the beams that formed the ceiling of the tent till everything stopped spinning.  
Slowly, he turned his head to the side. Her copper hair was bound in a plait around her face, her eyes furrowed in a frown. When he turned his head to her, her features relaxed and he saw her remember to breathe again.

"You're back," he said hoarsely, turning his head slowly, slowly in her direction. "Now stay here."  
Relta nodded, a tiny movement of her head, while Ahma broke out into a wail that might have been one of joy, but was probably just relief.


	29. 29

Relta was not a good nurse.  
Then again, nor was Achilles a good patient.

He lay on the cot on the floor and cursed at her and Ahma every time they touched him. After she had emptied the tent of onlookers, well-wishers and hangers-on, she knelt beside him and delicately examined his wounds. Ahma knelt on the other side, whispering soft words in her own language, stroking the skin of his arm.

Relta fervently wished she'd paid more attention to her mother's healing craft. She knew a few tricks and understand the power of a small number of herbs; little more.

But the Myrmidons who had gathered outside the tent looked at her expectantly when she went out for clean washing water.  
"Well?" Eudorus asked. "How does he fare, my lady?"  
"The same as he fared this morning," she answered. "If anything, more ill-tempered."

Their faces fell and she realised that they thought she was capable of some kind of miracle.  
"I'm not a healer," she said again, her patience wearing thin.  
"But when you came back, the skies cleared," Timon said. "Within minutes, the clouds disappeared and the heavens were blue."  
_That's called weather, _Relta fumed, _I'm not responsible for the vagaries of the weather. _____

_____ _

But she nodded politely, smiled patiently and softly said, "That wasn't me, I assure you."  
Her assurance made no difference; the men grinned at her as though they were all complicit in some kind of secret.  
Achilles' witch, his weather-controlling queen, had returned to care for him. He would be back on his feet in a matter of days!

_____ _

She got the water and returned inside.

_____ _

Achilles' leg was bound and she was afraid to undo the bindings; Ahma told her that Phoenix himself had done it and Relta trusted the older king's skill well enough to let it be. She made sure his other wounds were clean and, despite his protests, took his sharpest knife to his hair and cut it all to the same length.

_____ _

"Leave me alone," he growled, as the first locks fell.  
He tried to push her hand away but that meant moving his bandaged shoulder and he gasped with pain as he did so.  
"You look like a fool," she said sharply. "Your hair is sticking up at all angles, you look utterly ridiculous. I'm going to make you look like less of an idiot."

_____ _

That seemed to convince him; he reluctantly allowed her hack the rest of his hair off, which Ahma gathered up almost reverently and took outside.  
With his hair short and his face thinner, he looked younger and more vulnerable, and it made something in Relta's chest swell and press against her ribs.

_____ _

Spontaneously she leaned over and placed her cool forehead against his warm one, breathing in the scent of his skin underneath the smell of his sweat and the weeping wound. He raised his good hand to her cheek and they remained there, silently, till the leather straps were pushed aside and Ahma returned.

_____ _

"You need to eat something," Relta said.  
"I'm not hungry," was his curt reply.  
"Still, you need to eat something."  
"Woman," he said sharply, "Are you deaf? I'm not hungry."

_____ _

He pulled himself up into a half-sitting position and his face turned grey as he did so.  
"Man," she snapped back in the same tone, "Are you deaf? You need to eat something."  
She gestured at Ahma. "He needs a broth, a soup. Something warm and light. Do you understand?"  
"Ahma," Achilles said, raising his voice, "I'm not hungry."  
Ahma's eyes darted from one to the other, she hesitated on the threshold.  
"Well, I am," Relta said. "Soup, Ahma, please. Now," she added when the woman hesitated again.

_____ _

She turned to Achilles when the old woman had left.  
"Tonight," she said, "you are going to eat some damned soup. And tomorrow things are going to change, do you hear me?"

_____ _

He rolled his eyes and lowered himself carefully back on to the cot, hissing as his shoulder brushed against the canvas. His eyes closed and his lips moved; she wasn't entirely sure but she thought he was mouthing, Witch.

_____ _

xXx

_____ _

He ate a few mouthfuls of soup, then she let Ahma give him the milk of the poppy and they went outside. A few of the Myrmidons were still outside the tent, sitting on the nearby rocks playing stones or knuckles.

_____ _

They stopped talking when she approached.  
"He has to come outside tomorrow," she said. "We need some kind of shelter or canopy to keep the sun off him, but he needs fresh air."  
There was a murmur of protest – what about his humours? How could she balance his humours outside in the air, like a savage? There were herbs to be burnt and sacrifices to be made! And surely he would need more blood-letting if he was exposed to too much sun?

_____ _

Relta bit her tongue.  
"He needs to be out in the air," she repeated firmly.  
"The kings don't want him outside," Eudorus said into the awkward silence that followed her words. "They say he is bad for morale. And we think – "  
"We're sure –" Patroclus added.  
"- the Trojans are gearing up for another attack. They don't want the men discouraged by the sight of Achilles ... like that."  
He looked at her, his silver eyes pleading, begging her to understand.  
"I'm sorry," she said, "but tomorrow he's going out into the air for a few hours. It would be better if a few of you could help me because it will happen and it will be far easier if Ahma and I had some help."  
She stared them down, looking from one to the next. A couple of the Myrmidons held her gaze defiantly, others looked away, embarrassed.

_____ _

"Good night," she said finally and went back inside the tent.

_____ _

xXx

_____ _

"No more milk of poppy," she said to Ahma. "He can have valerian during the day but he only gets poppy at night."  
The Abyssinian snorted.  
"I'm serious, Ahma," Relta said. "If I catch you giving him some, I'll make you drink the whole jug yourself. And don't think I'm joking."  
"She'd not joking," Achilles said weakly.

_____ _

They looked down at him. The two women had washed him as best they could and carefully dressed him on one of his embroidered black robes. Ahma had combed his cropped hair back, using some olive oil to keep the unruliest locks from sticking up. Achilles' face was gaunt and ashen, but he seemed stronger and was willing to allow himself to be brought outside.

_____ _

Relta waved at Eudorus through the open doorway and he came in, followed by three other warriors. They carefully lifted Achilles outside the tent, where they had placed a low chair underneath a small canopy. Ahma placed a couple of pillows at his back and he sat up, wincing.  
Immediately some of the other warriors came over to see him, hailing him joyfully as they approached.  
For the first time since she returned, she saw Achilles smile as he raised his good arm to return their salute.

_____ _

She looked up and caught Eudorus' eye.  
He nodded happily at her and she beckoned him to follow her inside Achilles' tent.  
"Get me a woman," she said, scooping up a handful of coins from the little chest on the floor.  
"My lady?"  
"A slave, I need a maid. And not one of those silly little handmaidens from Thrace, I want a capable woman. Get me a northern woman if you can."  
Eudorus nodded.  
"Leave it up to me," he said.

_____ _

He returned a short time later with a sullen woman in tow.  
She was as tall as he was and broadly built, her face set in a scowl. Relta was busy tidying the tent when he came in; she pushed back her sweaty hair and looked at the woman who followed behind him, looking around the inside of the structure with open distaste.

_____ _

Outside came a roar of laughter and Relta recognised Odysseus' laugh among them. The warriors might have been preparing for battle, but they still had time to gather outside Achilles' tent and exchange ribald comments.

_____ _

"She's from the Gaulish tribes, my lady. Her previous owner said she is most capable but stubborn as a mule. You might have to take the stick to her now and again," Eudorus said, pushing the woman towards her.

_____ _

"What's your name?" Relta said.  
She knew bits of some of the languages of the Gauls – at least, she understood a bit. They had words in common and there had always been Gaulish traders in their village.  
The slave woman raised her eyebrows in surprise.  
"Dunni," she said, pulling her dark hair to show her. Donn meant brown in her language too, so Relta knew why she'd been called that name. Her voice was low and husky like a man's and once she started talking, she did not intend to stop.

_____ _

Dunni said, "Why was I brought here? Are you Achilles' slave as well? I heard he'd died, all the women are talking about it, then one of them said he was broken into bits like a stick and now he lies a cripple in his bed but that was him outside, wasn't it? He was laughing as I came so he doesn't look that bad anymore – "  
"I'm not his slave," Relta interrupted, "But you are mine. And now I need you to help me. I want this place cleaned up before he comes back inside. Help me push the bed over to the wall, then we're going to ... " she searched for the word in Gaulish but gave up. "...rake the sand," she finished in Greek.

_____ _

Eudorus, still standing by the door, looked at her curiously.  
Relta went up to him and listed the things she wanted off the boat:  
"He has chests in storage," she said. "I want any drapes and rugs you can, if the mice haven't got to them. Wall hangings, tapestries – any gold he has taken in conquest, like platters and bowls. Bring them to me."  
"But my lady," Eudorus said, glancing furtively over his shoulder, "If the Trojans attack, we might need to leave in a hurry. Are you sure you want all of his treasures off the boat?"  
"Yes," she answered.  
Eudorus paused, chewed his lip.

_____ _

"Please," she said in a soft voice. "Trust me on this, Eudorus."  
The Myrmidon nodded and left the tent. She heard him call a couple of the men's names as he left, then she went outside and knelt at Achilles' right hand, watching him try to disguise his pain in front of the other warriors gathered around.

_____ _

A horn sounded from down the beach and the other men stood, putting on their helmets, adjusting the straps of their shields.  
Achilles looked at them longingly.  
"You will be joining us soon enough, my friend," Odysseus said, his eyes crinkling with good humour. "I see you are well on the path to recovery. In a day or two the Myrmidons will swell our ranks again."  
"But not yet," Relta interjected.

_____ _

The Myrmidons looked at the other men hurrying by and she felt their impatience, their desire to join them. The horn blared again and the men took their leave, hurrying down the beach to assemble with the rest of the army.  
Achilles watched them go, then fell back against the cushions. His face had that grey pallor again; all of his energy had been spent on talking and teasing with his friends.  
Relta nodded at Timon and said, "Please carry him inside."

_____ _

xXx

_____ _

"What witchcraft is this?" Achilles wondered when he woke.

_____ _

Ahma had applied poultices to his wounds before giving him a dose of valerian. He'd eaten a small bowl of soup and drunk some warm wine before lying back on the cot they'd carried him in on. He slept soundly, not even waking when Dunni dropped a stack of platters outside the tent.

_____ _

The Gaulish woman and Ahma had helped her clear out and clean the tent, gathering up the clothes and goblets Achilles had discarded carelessly, sweeping and raking out the sand before laying down a woven rug that Eudorus had brought up from the depths of the boat. The bed was pushed to the side then Relta covered it with the cloth that she herself had embroidered, back in her other life, when she was a queen.

_____ _

They hung the sides of the tent with tapestries woven in Persia and stolen from some eastern kingdom, then she had Timon, who was the ship's carpenter, to make her a sideboard and a low table. He reappeared a couple of hours later with some furniture that would not win prizes for beauty, but were functional and sturdy – and could be smartened up with some of the cloths Eudorus had brought from the boat.  
Relta arranged the divan and the table on the rug, scattered plump cushions on the floor and set out a selection of gold and silver goblets on the sideboard.  
When Achilles awoke, his tent was transformed.

_____ _

"It looks ..." he began.  
"Better? More comfortable? More befitting a Prince of Phtia?"  
"It looks different," he conceded, then squinted at the shape of the stranger standing behind her. "Who is that?"  
Dunni stepped forward and bowed.  
"This is Dunni, from the land of the western Gauls. She's mine, I bought her," Relta added quickly.  
She didn't mention she'd bought the woman with his money.  
"So you have slaves, now?" Achilles said and there was a note of teasing in his voice. "You really are making yourself at home."

_____ _

Relta grinned at him.  
"You need to get off the sand," she said. "It's not fitting for a Prince to be lolling about on the floor."  
"Lolling about on the floor," Achilles grumbled good-naturedly, "As if I had a choice."

_____ _

He allowed Timon and Eudorus to help him slowly and carefully onto the divan.  
"Are the men back?" he asked. "How goes the battle?"  
"They are holding the line," Eudorus answered carefully, "But there are many losses."  
Achilles frowned.  
"Agamemnon swears there are reinforcements coming from Greece and Sparta," Timon said. "A scout boat landed yesterday and told of a fleet of boats coming towards Troy."  
"I hope they are his and not friends of King Priam," Achilles said drily.  
"We'll see soon enough," said Relta briskly. "In the meantime, it won't hurt you to eat and Ahma wants to clean your head."  
Achilles rolled his eyes and she pretended to cuff him.  
"The sooner I am well enough to put manners on her, the better," he said.  
The two warriors laughed and left the tent.

_____ _

Relta followed them.  
"We will need wine," she said. "Get a cask from the ship, one of the good wines. When the men have returned from battle, they should come by and report to Achilles of the fighting."  
Eudorus frowned thoughtfully.  
"Is that wise, my lady?"  
"He is the Prince of Phtia. He cannot fight but he can hold court. Invite Odysseus and Phoenix, the rest will follow. We'll uncask the good wine and I'll have the Gaulish woman get food – we'll have platters of cheese, bread and meat for anyone who has an appetite."  
"Agamemnon will not come," Eudorus said. "In fact, he might take offence if the other kings go to see him."  
"That is not my concern," replied Relta haughtily. "Achilles is my concern and he will want to hear a report of the fighting."  
Eudorus sighed and nodded slowly.  
"Very well, my lady," he said. "But I truly fear you will end up offending Agamemnon."  
"Everything offends Agamemnon," she said. "And I have offended him so much already, a little more insult will make no difference."

_____ _

xXx

_____ _

By midnight, the tent was full and they had to throw open the curtain to let in the cool night air. The kings had gathered, sitting cross-legged around the low table, helping themselves to the food and wine that Dunni and Relta had laid out and swiftly refilled when necessary.

_____ _

Achilles was sitting upright on the divan, his injured leg still bound tightly, but not appearing to cause him pain.  
His tousled hair gleamed golden in the lamplight and he talked earnestly, giving the other men directions for the next day's battles, his good arm moving expansively as he discussed how they should position their men and what tactics he expected Hector to employ.

_____ _

Voices rose and fell, and occasionally the tent swelled with laughter at one of Odysseus' dry witticisms. Relta watched Achilles like a hawk and when she saw his face begin to pale, she swooped in and began to whoosh the men out.  
"Time to leave," she said, smiling at them. "Because if Prince Hector decides to strike early in the morning we will all be done for, I'm sure."  
The kings and generals laughed and gathered their things, saluted Achilles, clapping him on his good arm and bid their farewell.

_____ _

Within minutes the tent was empty.  
Ahma and Dunni gathered up the goblets and platters for washing, bowed and withdrew. Relta doused all the lamps but one, then went over to the divan where Achilles lay.  
"Would you like to sleep there tonight?" she asked.  
"No, help me up," he replied.  
She hesitated but he gestured for her to help him and she bent down so he could wrap an arm around his shoulders. He raised himself slowly, then half-hopped, half-fell on to the bed. His face was covered in sweat when she straightened his broken leg as carefully and gently as she could, but he did not complain.

_____ _

"Shall I get you some milk of the poppy?" she asked.  
"No," Achilles replied. "I do not need it."  
He closed his eyes.  
"I am healing. It's good. I don't need the poppy milk anymore."

_____ _

Eyes still closed, he patted the bed beside him.  
"Now take off your robe and get in beside me," he said. "I can't do anything to you yet, but at the very least you can ensure that I have pleasant dreams."  
She snorted, but slipped her chiton off.  
She bent to blow out the last lamp and when she looked up, she saw him grinning at her in the darkness.  
"Come to bed, white queen," he said and she slipped in beside him, pressing her naked body against his side, his good arm underneath her head.  
"I feel much better already," he whispered.

_____ _


	30. 30

"And so," Nestor concluded, his gazing moving from one person to the next, "as you can imagine, our King of Kings is praying for rain."  
His eyes landed on Relta and he smiled at her benignly.  
She smiled back, not sure what he was getting at.  
"That bloody Hector!" Menelaus roared. "Three days in a row he batters us down! Where is he getting those men from? Where? If those bastard Phoenicians are sending him reinforcements behind our backs –"

The kings had seen three days of fighting; they had spent three nights meeting in Achilles' tent, dissecting their battles and wondering where the Trojan Prince had suddenly found the wherewithal to wage such relentless war on the Greek forces. He was pounding them; driving them back to the sand. Already some of the lower men were sending their wives back to the villages they had come from, while some of the kings had discreetly packed their choicest treasures on their boats, ready to flee when Hector finally broke their defences.

On the third night, Menelaus had turned up at the door of the tent, his ruddy face flushed and defensive.

"All hail," he said to the assembled men. "So this is where my brother's generals find themselves of an evening?"  
"You do us an honour, King of Sparta, with your visit," Relta said quickly. "Does he not, Achilles?"  
Menelaus had looked her up and down with a sneer.  
"She speaks for you now, Myrmidon?" he said.  
"She speaks not for me but she is certainly a better hostess," Achilles replied drily. "Come in, man, and take a seat. Tell us what Hector got up to today."

Relta noticed a look of relief flit over Menelaus' face as he pushed in among the men to find a place to sit.  
She pressed a goblet of wine in his hand and signalled to Ahma to come forward with a platter. Menelaus, already mid-anecdote, barely paused as his fleshy hand tore off some bread and dipped it crudely in the oil. Chewing and bellowing, his ruddy face grew redder and he made expansive hand gestures to underscore all the punishments he, personally, would inflict on Hector as soon as he got his hands on him.

Warmed by the wine, the food and the atmosphere of camaraderie amongst the kings and warriors in Achilles' tent, Menelaus began to mellow and soon his loud laugh could be heard ten paces away outside. As the night drew in and the darkest hour approached, the exhausted men took their leave in ones or pairs and departed the tent. 

Soon only Phoenix, Nestor and Menelaus were left and Relta had a suspicion that she would be pushing Menelaus out the door when his fellow kings had gone. For now, she knelt in the sand behind Achilles, almost hidden in the shadows thrown by the candles, her hands folded demurely in her lap. She tried to keep her head down, but she couldn't help but watch the kings before her: Nestor and Phoenix upright and alert, Menelaus fighting sleep and the effects of too much of Achilles' good wine.

Nestor glanced around, made eye contact with Phoenix - who inclined his head a fraction – and tried again.  
"King Agamemnon feels our troops need respite from the fighting," he said, staring at Achilles. "And some strong winds to push the Mycenaean ships towards the shore."  
Achilles smiled and wordlessly picked up an olive, popped it in his mouth.  
"Hector seems to have been kissed by Apollo," Phoenix ventured. "His troops march onto the battlefield with a renewed ferocity – day after day. As though they might never tire."  
"Hmm," Achilles said. 

He leaned back on his elbow so his bare shoulder was almost touching Relta. She raised her hand and touched his skin, brushing the clean pink scar that crossed ran half-way down his back to the nape of his neck. She watched a tiny shiver run down his back at her touch and she dropped her hand back into her lap.  
"Truly, we would be blessed by rain," Nestor said.  
Achilles nodded.

Suddenly, Menelaus could bear it no more.  
"For fuck's sake, man! Get that witch of yours to conjure up a damned storm!"  
Achilles turned his head to look at her, his face split into a broad grin.  
"Hear that, witch? Agamemnon wants a storm. Get to it."  
Appalled, she glared at him, but he shifted his weight and moved aside, so she could be seen better by the three kings sitting across from them.

"My lady," Nestor began, "we have heard of your ability to summon storms. They say you were released from Troy when you opened the heavens and it poured rain – "  
"No, no, no," Relta began. "I was released from Troy and _then _it rained. That's something entirely different – "  
"When we were outside the bloody gates of Kalios, you called down a tempest on us!" Menelaus roared. "A damned tempest! Nearly washed us all away!"  
"Yes, but that storm had been brewing for days. The clouds, you often can't see them come in over the mountains if you are approaching from the beach – "  
"The sky was cloudless," Menelaus growled. "And then you called down a storm."__

____

The three men opposite looked at her expectantly.  
"I didn't," she whispered helplessly.  
She looked at Achilles for help, but he was still grinning at her.  
"Agamemnon wants a storm," he repeated insouciantly. "Give the man a storm."  
"Achilles, hush," she hissed.

____

"Do what you must do," Nestor said. "But for the sake of all the Greeks on this beach, we need the intervention of whatever gods you pray to. Otherwise Hector will be burning our tents before the week is out."  
He rose and held out a hand to help Phoenix up.  
The older man stood stiffly, then he grabbed Menelaus by the elbow.  
"Come, Spartan, the boy needs his rest and the queen must prepare her magic."  
"I really –" she began, but Achilles put a finger to his lips.

____

She accompanied them to the door.  
Phoenix linked his arm through Menelaus', who set off with the rolling gait of a man who'd drunk too deeply.  
Nestor watched them go.  
"Well, if he must fight tomorrow, it will be fuelled by a hangover and that, if anything, seems to make Menelaus fight better. He fights well when he's angry," Nestor said mildly.  
"My lord," Relta said anxiously, "I cannot control the weather. I swear it. The weather is in the hands of the gods, not mine."

____

Nestor said nothing, but he breathed deep.  
"Do you smell rain?" he asked.  
Relta hesitated and inhaled the night air.  
"Yes," she said. "And the wind is restless. There will most likely be a storm, but it's not of my making."  
"But you feel it?"  
"Yes, but – "  
"So the White Queen senses a storm," Nestor said quickly. "That is what I will tell King Agamemnon."

____

Relta felt a mixture of anger and frustration, an impulsive desire to stamp her foot.  
"Listen to me," she snapped. "I can't click my fingers and magic up a storm for Agamemnon."  
"But if you _could_ ," Nestor replied, lowering his head towards hers, "you _would_ , because doing so might show Agamemnon that you were willing to show him obeisance. Am I right, my Queen?"  
And Relta couldn't be entirely sure, but in the darkness she thought she saw him wink.

____

"Fine," she said resignedly. "Fine. If - _If_ I were in a position to create storms, I would call one up as a gesture of deference to the wishes of our mighty King of Kings. Happy now?"  
"Delighted." Nestor beamed at her. "I will report our conversation back to Agamemnon. I am sure he will be delighted. He might even deign to come see Achilles himself, if we get a break from this fighting. Zeus willing."  
"Zeus willing," she repeated wearily.  
Nestor kissed her softly on the hand and set off down the beach in darkness.  
Relta watched him leave and went back inside.

____

Achilles was lying on the bed. In the past few days he had started moving about more, paying little attention to the leg still bound in its splint. He was talking about taking his chariot to the battlefield, but the combined imploring of Ahma and Relta had persuaded him to wait a little longer.

____

"So?" he asked as she started to gather up cups and goblets to leave in a basket outside the door for the slaves to wash in the morning.  
"So: your stupid king wants a storm. A nice big one. Enough to stop the fighting for a few days. And I'm supposed to make it with my supposed magic arts. And thanks for your help, by the way – "  
She rounded at him and threw an empty cup at his head.  
He laughed and deflected it with his arm.  
"Idiot."  
"Aw, give poor Agamemnon a storm," Achilles wheedled, barely able to stop laughing. "Just a little one. Don't be cruel, my Queen."  
"Shut up," she said. "What will happen if there's no storm? What will become of me then? I'm just waiting for Hector to stop long enough to give Agamemnon a chance to come wobbling down the beach to run the blade of his sword through my – "  
"Hush."  
"Damn you, Myrmidon. I will not hush. It's all very well for you – why don't you trek up to Mount Olympus on your broken leg and ask Zeus for a storm? You're the one so well-acquainted with your ridiculous deities – "  
"Quiet!" Achilles snapped.  
He raised a finger and pointed at the roof.

____

Above her, Relta heard the patter of drops hit the canvas.  
As she stood in silence, the sound became louder. Within minutes, the canvas roof was swaying under the deluge and she had to place some of the empty platters on the rug to gather the water that was dripping into the tent.  
Achilles lay back on his pillow, his hacked hair standing up at all angles, blue eyes almost shut with laughter.  
"Fuck you," she huffed.  
He clapped his hands, still laughing.  
"Well done, witch," he said. "Well done."

____


	31. 31

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Thanks for reading along. I'm always happy to read your comments, nice to know you're there ...

There was no fighting the next day.

The wind whipped the rain through the camp, blowing roofs off their tents and knocking down the pens that kept the animals in. Terrified goats ran down the beach, knocking over pots, as little boys tried in vain to round them up again. Thunder rumbled across a sky that was as dark as dusk all day long and lightning lit up the sky as Zeus seemed intent on throwing everything he had into the sea before Troy.

The battlefield became a mud bath; there would be no more battles till the ground was dry and the wind had died down.

Achilles and Relta lay in the bed, which they'd had to push into a new position after the tent had sprung another leak. Achilles had pulled her furs out of the chest that had come from Kalios and they'd spent most of the day huddled together listening to the small fire crackling and hissing in the middle of his tent. Relta had pulled the leather strips covering the door aside a little to let in some air and out some of the smoke; through the gap they watched the rain spill down from the slate-grey sky, as though the gods were emptying buckets.

"Will Agamemnon be pleased with me, do you think?" she'd asked playfully.  
Achilles nodded.  
"For sure," he replied, mock-solemnly. "I'd say he's very well-disposed towards you now."  
She'd laughed and snuggled closer so he could kiss the top of her head. He'd been trying to initiate more intimacy, but whenever he moved too quickly, he hissed through his teeth, writhing in pain.  
"We have time," she'd said, pushing him gently away.  
"But if you just – you know, like this - "  
"We have time," repeated Relta. "You will survive without sex for another couple of days, believe me."  
Achilles shook his head reproachfully.  
"I mightn't. And if I don't survive," he said in a mock-sorrowful tone, "It'll be your fault."

Relta laughed.  
Lying under the furs – even unpleasant wolf furs – in Achilles' tent – even if it was smoky and it leaked – with his good arm underneath her shoulders and her fingers splayed across his flat stomach, she had an unfamiliar feeling in her chest. Something warm that crept up under her ribs, up her throat and spread across her lips.  
Wait now: she was happy.

The realisation made the happiness disappear, like a candle snuffed.  
Her child was half-way across the world without her and she had a vial of poison in the pouch she had retrieved the morning before, a potent poison waiting to be administered to a petulant king.  
And then what?  
Then, if she did not die or was not killed, she would have to beat a hasty retreat to Troy and watch while Hector slaughtered them all before boarding a Trojan craft, bound for Carthage.

When she looked up, Achilles was looking at her, observing her.  
"What were you thinking about?" he asked. "And don't say 'nothing'."  
"I was thinking that I was happy," came her careful answer. "And then I tried to remember when I last felt this way."  
It was an answer that seemed to work.  
He rolled carefully, wincing, on his side so they lay face to face, noses touching.  
"I'm glad you're happy," he said.

xXx

By evening, the rain had abated and the thunder was just a distant rumble, the occasional grumble of a disgruntled god. Someone had reported seeing a light on the horizon; a single flicker, quickly gone. Was it lightning, a trick of the eye?

No, Timon reported, Agamemnon was convinced that his much-longed for troops were on the way.  
Boats full of strong and eager Mycenaean warriors, reinforcements to beat that Trojan devil back behind his father's walls.  
Despite the fact that the entire camp swam in rivers of wet mud, despite the collapsed tents and lost goats, the mood among the Achaeans was quietly optimistic.

That evening, Dunni and Ahma turned up bearing the large jugs of wine and the basket of goblets. As the rain slowed to a light drizzle, Relta kicked out the fire, knowing the tent would warm up quickly under the press of bodies. Timon and Echepolus, who was responsible for the repair of the ship's sails, had quickly sewn and patched the roof, making it watertight for the evening ahead.

Odysseus, as always, was first, shaking the rain off his cloak as he came in. He was followed by his generals, who brought gifts of wine and cheese, then some of the other kings. By the time the rain had completely stopped and darkness had set in, the tent was crammed and some of the men were sitting on upturned pots in the damp sand outside the doorway.

Relta and Ahma picked their way carefully among the men, refilling cups and passing around plates. Dunni ran back and forth fetching more food when their stocks ran low, directing drunken men towards the latrines with a push. Achilles sat upright on his divan, his broken leg stretched out before him, laughing loudly at Phoenix's wry recounting of a battle lost in his father's time.

Relta, her back to the door, was watching him, admiring the healthy colour that now replaced that yellow pallor she'd found him with. Next to her, Ahma was smiling, nodding in satisfaction at the sight of her golden boy talking animatedly with Odysseus.  
She only realised Agamemnon was behind her when the tent went silent. Then all the men, except Achilles, scrambled to their feet.  
Slowly, she turned around.  
"King of kings," she said, bowing.

Agamemnon was not much bigger than she was, he was wearing a robe that was hung with silver discs, his greying hair was tied back with silver thread. He was shared his brother's ruddy complexion, as well as his general air of disgruntlement.

"So this is she," Agamemnon said. "This is the woman who controls the weather. The witch from the Northern Isles. The one with the hair the colour of fire."  
He grabbed one of her plaits and raised it to his nose, pulling her head roughly with it.  
Relta bit her lip as a shot of pain crossed her scalp.  
The Mycenaean dropped her hair and smiled at the assembled company.  
"Well, well, well," he said mildly. "I thought I would see most of you in my tent this evening, as we have a lot to discuss - given that fresh troops are to arrive here any day. But how can I compete with the attractions of a witch?"

"She's not a witch," Achilles said in that insolent tone he seemed to save for Agamemnon.  
"She should have been _my_ witch," Agamemnon said. "You took my woman, Achilles. Without my permission."  
The Myrmidon's eyes narrowed, and Relta saw Odysseus stretch out a toe to tip Achilles' leg, a nudge of warning.  
Agamemnon smiled at the men in the tent and laughed loudly, his voice light.

"But let bygones be bygones," said the king expansively. "What does it matter, as long as the White Queen is making storms for us and not for the Trojans, eh?"  
"To Greece!" said Odysseus and held up his cup.  
Ahma thrust one at Agamemnon, who looked at her closely before he took the proffered goblet and held it aloft.  
"To victory!" he bellowed. "Now that Achilles is on the path to good health, it is only a matter of weeks before Troy is ours!"

He downed his wine and flung the cup on the floor. The others in the tent followed suit and Relta winced at the noise of the metal goblets clattering onto the sand.  
"Now get to bed, you dogs!" Agamemnon cried jovially. "Tomorrow I will see you in my quarters so we can plan our next attack."  
He turned on his heel, making eye contact with Relta for a second, before he left the tent with his brother and his aides in tow.  
"That's told us," Odysseus said drily. "Aye, well, I'd better take my leave then."  
He shook Achilles hand, then left the tent. The mood soured, the others followed; it was quickly empty.

Ahma and Relta silently tidied up. Achilles was thoughtful, his chin in his hand. When they had finished, Ahma heaved up the basket with the dirty cups and plates.  
"Good night," she said.  
"Good night, old mother," he replied absent-mindedly.  
She beamed at him, then Relta, before leaving the tent.  
Achilles half-limped, half-hopped over to the bed, pulling off his robe. He rolled under the covers, his back to her, clearly not keen on talking.

She slipped outside, into the damp night air. The stars were behind a thick cover of cloud, so the camp was covered in pitch darkness. She made her way carefully to the latrine and picked her way back, bumping into a couple of urns, stubbing her toe on a rock before falling inelegantly over a tent peg and tumbling head first on to the sand. As she sat darkness, winded and disoriented, she heard an odd sound.  
A gurgling sound.

Had she broken someone's water pot? Or chamber pot? She wasn't sitting in a puddle of piss, was she?  
No, it was coming from nearby, now accompanied by a strange wheezing sound.  
She began to feel a bit afraid – it could be a wild animal, they often crawled into camp, looking to scavenge scraps and leftovers.  
The sound grew louder, faster, and something about it seemed at once so alien but somehow so familiar. Relta got on her hands and knees and crawled in the direction it was coming from.  
"Ow!"  
Her knee pressed on something sharp and hard – when she pulled it out from beneath her, she discovered it was a metal plate. Cautiously she stretched out a hand and hit something cold and hard.  
A cup.  
And another.  
And another.

Then she knew.  
"Ahma?" she cried. "Ahma?"  
The wheeze was loud, like an animal dying and Relta found the woman's body in the darkness. She felt along her body, trying to find her head, but her fingers brushed against the hilt of a knife.  
"Ahma," she cried hoarsely.  
There was wetness, stickiness, everywhere and Relta knew instinctively that the old woman had not just been stabbed; her throat had been cut as well.  
"I'm here," she said, then turned away and shouted, "Help! Help! Achilles, help!"  
He wouldn't hear her – how could he? But she knew that he was the one Ahma wanted to see, the last one she wanted to see.

A man rounded the side of the tent with a lamp, sank to his knees beside her.  
In the darkness, the blood was black and it was everywhere.  
Ahma stared up at her, drew a last, hoarse breath and was still, her eyes still open wide in terror.

Relta clapped her hands over her mouth to stop herself screaming.  
"My lady?"  
She turned, dazed, and found Eudorus at her side.  
He looked down and, by the light of the lamp, saw the dead body, saw Relta covered in blood.  
He looked at her in horror.  
"It's Agamemnon," she said, starting to cry. "He said Achilles stole his woman. So the king of kings took his."  
She wet her lips with her tongue and tasted Ahma's blood.


	32. 32

Ahma was buried without much ceremony.  
The slave women responsible for laying out the dead washed her carefully and wrapped her in a plain white cloth. Relta was led to the old woman's cot in the slave quarters, ignoring the curious stares of some women and the downright hostile glares from others who thought she was little better than one of them – just lucky to have landed in the right bed. She did not look at them, just pulled out the piece of cloth under Ahma's pillow and unfolded it slowly. It contained a small braid of coarse black hair and a coin that bore the likeness of a man, a coin chipped and worn. It wasn't even gold.

Relta turned it over in her hands.  
"That's Peleus of the Myrmidons, that is," said a voice.  
She looked up. Sitting on the cot across from her was an older woman with a small child on her knee.  
"Peleus?"  
"Father of Achilles," the woman said. "I think she thought it was Achilles' picture on there."  
Relta's heart felt like it would break: she knew instinctively that the braid was all Ahma'd had left of one of children, and she had treasured what she thought was the likeness of her other. She nodded wordlessly, smiled a weak smile at the child and left the tent, her head ducked low so she would not have to look at the other women.

Before Ahma was placed on the low pyre, Relta slipped the coin and the braid under the tight cloth, pushing them into the corpse's hands. Then she took her place a step behind Patroclus, who stood on Achilles' right. When the small gathered group – some slaves, Achilles, Patroclus and herself - had fallen silent, he stepped forward and lit the pyre. They watched the flames take hold, then Achilles turned on his heel and left. Patroclus looked at her. She shrugged and nodded for him to follow his cousin; she stayed with the women till the flames made her face burn and the timbers started to shift and fall.

On the way back to Achilles' tent, Odysseus fell into step beside her.  
"He is walking," he said, _à propos_ of nothing.  
"Yes," Relta said. "Since Ahma was murdered, he has become very ... determined."  
"Determined to do what?" Odysseus asked.  
She shrugged. "Determined to recover. Determined to walk."  
"Determined to kill Agamemnon?"

She stopped and faced him.  
"Does he have reason to do so?" she asked carefully. "More than usual, that is?"  
"Come on," Odysseus chided. "We both know Agamemnon had his little woman killed. He wanted to strike him in his heart and he could not kill you, so he took the Abyssinian. Surely you don't believe Agamemnon's story – that some black-hearted rascal stabbed the old woman to steal a few dirty gold goblets?"  
Relta looked at him.  
Despite herself, she liked Odysseus. He was smart, he was funny. He was loyal but she was never sure to whom. That he was Achilles' friend was undeniable; but so was the fact that he was Agamemnon's servant.

"Are you trying to ask me whether he will kill Agamemnon to avenge the death of his slave?" she asked. "The answer is no; no, he will not. He is a Prince of Phtia, he will not start a war on the King of Greece because he may or may not have had his slave killed."  
"This is the official line, then?" Odysseus asked.  
She shrugged coolly.  
"There is no official line," she said. "It is what it is. It would be beneath Achilles' dignity to get himself involved in a skirmish with his king for this reason."

Odysseus stared at her and she stared back at him. He covered his chin with his hand and stroked his beard thoughtfully. Patroclus appeared at his side and looked from one of them to the other. He opened his mouth to speak, then shut it again promptly.

"See, with every passing day she speaks more and more like a Greek, my young friend," Odysseus said, draping an arm around Patroclus' shoulders. "Yet with each day that passes, she looks less and less like a Greek. What is happening here?"  
Relta stiffened.  
"Dunni has been doing my hair," she said casually. "She is a northerner, this is how we braid hair."  
"Is she of your tribe?" Odysseus asked. "I hear you talking together."  
_Stupid Greek,_ Relta thought. _Anything north of Illyria was savage territory, as far as they were concerned._  
"She's from the mainland," she said. "I'm from the islands. But we're of the same mother tribe, our languages have many similarities."  
"All of this: the braids, the way you are wearing your cloak, the ink on your neck – what does it mean?"  
Relta stiffened.  
With a small horse-hair brush, Dunni had painted the three tiny circles on the nape of her neck, just where her hairline began. They marked her as a child of Danu and no one had even noticed, not even Achilles.  
But it had not escaped Odysseus' eagle eyes.

She looked at him coldly.  
"I didn't realise you were so interested in women's fashions," she said.  
"I'm not, per se," Odysseus answered. "You just seem very out-landish."  
Patroclus laughed nervously. "I think you look very pretty, my lady."  
"Out-landish?" she repeated, ignoring the boy.  
"Yes, an outlander. I thought that is what you northerners call anyone from outside your territory – outlanders?"  
"Yes," she admitted. "Maybe it looks a bit out-landish. But I _am_ the outlander here, after all."  
"And as an outlander, do you feel called upon to kill the King of Greece?" the Ithacan king asked. "Perhaps it's not beneath _your_ dignity?"

 _Pick your words carefully,_ she thought.  
"Why would I feel moved to kill Agamemnon?" she asked. "Ahma was not my woman."  
Odysseus smiled at her. Stared at her for what seemed like an age.  
"I hope you remember that," he said finally. "Or Achilles will pay the price."

xXx

"He wants to fight tomorrow," Patroclus said. "Now that he can walk again."  
They were hurrying towards Achilles' tent – she didn't know why.  
There was no rush, except to get away from Odysseus' curious gaze.  
"He can't," she said shortly. "He can't fight and he certainly can't walk. He can limp."

The fact that he could even limp was a miracle. Seeing Achilles coming out of his tent that morning had sent a ripple around the camp. The Myrmidon had demonstratively ripped off the splint Phoenix had so carefully tied and gingerly moved his leg, before walking on it – carefully, slowly.  
But walking nonetheless.

"Well, _he_ thinks he's fighting," Patroclus said, a tad proudly.  
The young man clearly worshipped his cousin, to the point that he seemed willing to support him in his foolishness.  
They were at the entrance to the tent.  
"We'll see about that," she said grimly.  
Patroclus made to pull back the curtain, but she shoo-ed him off and went inside.

Achilles stood, naked, in front of the wooden cross upon which his armour hung. He was testing the straps, his back to her.  
"I'll need it tomorrow. Get your woman to polish it," he said without turning around.  
"I will not," she said.  
He paused, turning his head a little. She saw the muscles in his jaw work.  
"That was an order, Queen," he said.  
"And I said no," she replied.

He turned to face her, raised his chin, his hands on his hips.  
He had lost weight, his body was leaner and the veins on his arms ran like rivulets down his skin. Relta tried to fix her eyes on his, but it was hard not to let her gaze drift downwards.

"Get. Your. Woman. To. Polish. It," he repeated.  
"You're not fighting," Relta countered.  
"Yes, I am. I can walk."  
He took two steps toward her, shrugging his shoulders. "See?"  
She jumped forward and kicked his bad leg, watched him crumple to the ground.  
"See?" she said.  
"Fucking witch," he roared.  
"It's not witchcraft!" she shouted in return. "It's _common sense!_ "

He grabbed her arm and she pulled him up.  
"I will fight tomorrow," he said. "I will show Agamemnon what I think of his war, his troops. If he rides past me, I might accidentally gut him with my sword."  
He leaned on her, moving his bad leg, gasping as he did.  
"Or," she said, "Or, instead of charging into battle like a wounded bull, you wait a couple more days until you have completely recovered. You wouldn't want to show weakness in front of your men, would you? Imagine how it would look – and all it would take is one ill-timed kick or shove and you'd end up on your knees at Agamemnon's feet."

Achilles looked away, shook his head. A slow grin crossed his face.  
"You are truly a manipulative wench," he said. "Has Odysseus been giving you lessons?"  
She laughed.  
_If only he knew._  
Achilles looked down at her and pushed back one of her out-landish braids.

"So why don't you ever end up on your knees at my feet?" he said, bending his mouth to her ear.  
Relta hesitated, then turned to face him, traced a line down the middle of his chest, into the dip in his ribcage. She pulled her robe up around her ankles so she could sink downwards, planting kisses on his taut stomach as she did.  
He groaned, gently took a handful of her hair to guide her head where he wanted it.  
"Now," he said hoarsely. "On your knees."  
She took him in her mouth, her head rising and dipping as he stroked her hair.

She closed her eyes, concentrated on the feel of his skin on her lips, his taste. She held herself steady, splaying her hands on his thighs. The only sound she heard was his ragged breathing, his murmured encouragement. She felt him grow, harden and she moved faster.

Then, suddenly, he stopped her, holding her skull still between his fingers.  
"What on earth - ?" he began and rubbed her nape with his thumb.  
She pulled back and looked up at him.  
"Who drew on your neck?" Achilles asked. "These circles - what are they?"  
She wrapped his cock in her fist and smiled up at him.  
"Do you really want to know now or can I tell you later?" she said, and slowly licked her top lip with the tip of her tongue.  
The Myrmidon grinned and his large hand guided her head back to where it had been.


	33. 33

Relta went back to the slave quarters with a handful of gold and silver bangles, which she distributed among the women who had prepared Ahma's body for burial. She thanked them, but they were reluctant to meet her eyes – the Thracians, the Egyptians, the Trojans, the Greeks, the Kalions, women from the southern countries like Ahma. All shapes, all colours, from her own freckled skin to the dark skin of the only other Abyssinian woman left among the slaves.

She looked around the tent, crammed with makeshift beds and cradles, private spheres marked out by haphazardly hung cloths and curtains, and she realised what these women already knew: but for a twist of fate she might have been sitting on the edge of a cot with a soldier's child on her knee or an archer's baby in her belly. 

Some of the women kept their backs to her as they rolled their belongings in their cloaks.  
"Are you leaving?" she asked curiously.  
The other women started tidying up around her; she had been stared at enough, now they had more important things to attend to.  
The older woman who'd slept next to Ahma straightened up and looked at her with a frank gaze.  
"Won't nobody be leaving here once the winter storms start," she said curtly. "We just move over the dunes for the winter. Can't camp out here on damp sand, so we pitch the tents on dry ground."  
"The Greeks move closer to the city? Isn't that dangerous? What if Priam's army attacks?"  
The woman snorted disparagingly.  
"Won't be much fightin'," she said. "Last winter and the winter before, we all just bunkered down till we saw the equinox on the other side. The Trojan bastards just pull in behind their walls and make themselves comfortable, probably hopin' we all die of the cold on their beach."

Winter.  
Her stomach fell, a whooshing, icy feeling that came with the realisation that if she didn't kill Agamemnon soon, very soon, she would be stuck in Achilles' tent till the spring came. There would be no boats westward and no chance to get on a ship to Carthage before the warm weather came. Any further delays in the spring and she would not get there in time.

And Hector would not like to have the Greek army sitting on his doorstep for one more winter, of this she was sure. Relta felt a sudden surge of urgency, a shortness of breath; she wondered where she had hidden the poison. She wondered how soon she could make that king of kings drink it.

xXx

As she was walking towards the tent, she saw Achilles, Patroclus and Odysseus sitting outside. Achilles was methodically sharpening the blade of one of his swords; the metal scraped the whetstone and the sound put her teeth on edge.

The three men looked up as she approached.  
"You missed a visit from on high," Achilles remarked.  
"From on high?" she repeated, not understanding the expression.  
"Agamemnon came to see how I was coping with the loss of such a beloved member of my household," he said, his voice without emotion. "His words."  
Patroclus made a noise in his throat like a growl.  
"I hope you told him to – " she began hotly but Achilles stood, extending the sword and examining its blade.  
"I thanked him for his concern," he said in that same dead tone.  
"Why, I – "  
"He is launching his last offensive against Troy before the storms set in," Odysseus interrupted quickly. "Your man here will fight again. The Greek soldiers will rejoice to see the Myrmidons swell their ranks. Priam's army will try to pound us into submission and we must all play our part in defending the beach."  
"Defending the beach," she repeated bleakly. "Defending the damned sand. A noble task, if ever there was one."

She looked at Patroclus, who shrugged helplessly.  
"You can't fight," she said to Achilles.  
He looked at her with the cold, assessing gaze he normally reserved for others.  
"I think I know best when I can fight," he said shortly. "Don't start, queen."

xXx

The next morning there was a call to battle; Achilles went.  
Relta watched him walk out of the tent, his leg was slightly stiff but he moved confidently.  
"At least the helmet fits better," he remarked drily, pulling it over his cropped hair.  
Relta said nothing, followed him silently outside.

That dawn when he had woken her and told her he was going to battle, she'd started to argue with him again, but he'd held up a hand.  
"I have to," he said shortly. "Or the Torjans will drive us back into the sea. Menelaus says Hector has been mustering for days."  
"But Achilles –"  
"You're not going to be one of those women who weeps, are you?" he asked, tugging the straps on his armour to make sure they were sewn fast. "A Phtian woman does not cry when her man goes into battle."  
"I'm not Phtian," she muttered, but he hadn't heard her – he'd gone outside to Patroclus, who was waiting with the horses.

So she'd been warned.  
When he took his leave, he ascended his chariot regally. Now she was no longer hidden away, she was allowed to stand outside with the slaves and the old men, watching as the Myrmidons gathered to leave. Achilles had glanced in her direction and nodded at her briefly before clicking his tongue and riding off with Eudorus at his side.

Relta had stood, rigid, and watched the men depart – Patroclus, clutching his newly-sharpened sword with Timon next to him, grinned at her from his chariot as they drew up level. One by one, she nodded at the men as they left, wondering how many would return. Because this battle felt different: Priam's army had been taunting them since before dawn with trumpets and drums from Troy's battlements. They had awoken the Greeks on the beach with a discordant cacophony, as though they wished to call them to their deaths. The noise had upset the animals, made the children cry and agitated the women. The men had hastily gathered their armour, prepared to march out.

Relta sat on the bed in the tent and tried to sew but it was too gloomy, so she went outside and took a walk down to the shore. As she walked, the wind whipped at her robe, changing direction and carrying the dull roar of the fighting beyond the sand dunes with it.

She passed Achilles' boat and it swayed, the wood moaning like a dying man as she passed, and she felt a shiver of foreboding crawl up her back like an insect. She felt drawn the edge of the battle, though she'd been determined to stay away. By the time she climbed up the sand dunes, her hand extended for balance as she did, the wind was pulling at her robe and she had plait her hair into a braid to stop it blowing into her eyes and mouth.

The other women looked at her, nodded; several discreetly stepped away, making sure they weren't close enough for her to strike up a conversation. Relta smiled at them, hoping they would smile back. To her relief, some did.

She raised a hand to her eyes to look out over the battlefield but could identify no troop colours that she knew.  
"The Myrmidons are over there," said a voice at her left. When she looked around, there stood a woman in a grubby chiton, her shoulders covered with a homespun cloak. She pointed to the western end of the wall, but still Relta could see no one she recognised, just a heaving mass of helmets, shields and swords.

"Prince Hector reminds you that you have to kill Agamemnon," the woman said softly.  
Relta's head spun around, but the woman was staring straight ahead.  
"Kill him or you will be stuck on this beach until the Trojans come down to burn you off it, is what he said," the woman continued, her lips barely moving. "And it will not be long before that happens."

Relta's mouth went dry. She kept her eyes on the battlefield, licked her lips to reply – but when she turned her head, the woman just smiled at her.  
"Once the winter winds come, you won't be sailing west," the woman continued. "You will be stuck here. And the offer will no longer stand come spring, he says. The choice is yours."  
The insect of foreboding crawled into her heart and Relta nodded, stricken.  
"I understand," she whispered. "Tell him I understand."  
The woman smiled again and walked off down the dunes, pulling her cloak around her.

xXx

The Greeks were not victorious, but they did not seem to lose either.  
Rather, it seemed that at some point both armies simply ran out of energy, ran out of the bloodlust that had fuelled the battle. Some of the Greek men began to move back, allowing themselves to be beaten back towards the dunes. The Trojans would not follow them, not caring to move out of range of their walls and their archers. And so a gulf began to emerge between the two armies, leaving a swathe of blood-stained sand. The great gates of Troy started to open and the Trojan army slowly fell back, dragging their wounded in behind the wall.

"Why don't they attack now?" Relta said to no one in particular, "The Trojans are retreating."  
"Because the Trojan archers won't step down till the gates have closed," a slave woman said. "This is what they do when no one wins – no side has won, no side has lost. Both have retreated. Both kings save face."  
She meekly glanced at Relta, up and down.  
"Best get back and fetch hot water," she said. "He will want to wash."  
"Thank you," Relta and smiled at her. She was rewarded with a shy smile in return before she turned to leave with the flock of women who hurried down the sandbanks, back to their tents.

She hurried back down the beach. The sky was darkening and she thought she heard the low rumble of thunder.  
"Get water," she said to Dunni, who was lingering at the entrance to Achilles' tent.  
Ahma would've filled the urns in expectation of his return, but luckily there was enough water for Achilles to wash. Relta stoked the embers of the fire and carefully poured some of the water in a small pot to heat up, listening to the sounds of the men returning.

There were cries from the women who were handed the dead bodies of the men they had loved and the men who had owned them, the sound of horses' harnesses and chariot wheels, warriors calling to each other as they assessed each others' wounds.

The curtain rattled open and he stood in the doorway.  
Relta jumped, startled, then he pulled off his helmet, grinning.  
"Happy to see me?" he said.  
"I am," she replied.  
It was not a lie. He was grinning, euphoric, as though the battle had restored something that his injuries had taken away.

She lifted the heavy pot and poured some of the hot water into his washing bowl, looking him over as she did, looking for cuts and wounds. But Achilles was covered in more dirt than blood, his lower legs were splattered with a mixture of muck and sand.  
"Winter is coming," he said, looking down. "We are fighting in a mudbath. There won't be many more days like this."  
"But you won?"  
He grinned at her again, dunking his head into the bowl and rubbing his cropped hair with his fingers.  
"Well, we didn't lose, which is enough of a cause for celebration for Agamemnon. He's called us to dine on his boat this evening, last time before we move up onto the dry land beyond the dunes."

She felt a flicker of hope.  
"We? Me, too?"  
Achilles looked at her sharply.  
"Since when have you been eager to dine in Agamemnon's presence?"  
"I'd like to get close enough to him to punch him in the face," she said quickly.

Achilles laughed drily, ducked his head in the water again, and then said, "I'm afraid you will have to wait your turn. I'm first."  
"I am serious, though: have I been invited to sup with him?"  
"Yes," Achilles said. "We shall go to the boat, we shall toast his magnificence, we shall drink his inferior wine and he will send us home before midnight to fight again tomorrow. That way he will not have to empty his stores to wine and dine us. But no face-punching. You are my woman now and I will not be told that I cannot keep you under control."  
He removed the leather cloth around his waist and stood naked by the wash bowl, grinning at her as he sluiced the water over his chest.

Relta paused for a second, the next pot of warm water in her hands and fought the desire to fling it at him.  
"We both know that you cannot keep me – " she started but stopped as the curtain opened and Dunni came in, water slopping from the buckets on the yoke.  
"Beg pardon," she said loudly.  
Achilles ignored her, kept his back to her as he continued to scrub off the dried blood and sand.

Dunni lowered the bucket and pointed at Achilles' behind. She winked at Relta and nodded approvingly.  
"Get out," Relta said in the language of the Gaul and Dunni snickered before exiting the tent.  
"I like her," Achilles said without turning around.  
Relta put the pot down.  
"You would," she said.  
"Make yourself pretty, my queen," he said, grinning at her over his shoulder. "Agamemnon will be looking for you tonight."

She waited till he'd left the tent, then put on a fresh chiton and bound it around the waist with a black scarf, then fixed a cloak at her shoulder with a long pin that had a metal knot at its top. She wasn't sure where Achilles had picked it up or what its purpose had been, but it reminded her of the shawl pins her people wore. Glancing around, she took Hector's vial of poison and tucked it carefully into the folds of the band around her waist, making sure it was secure.

When she was dressed, she called for her slave, and Dunni plaited her hair in the elaborate braids that the women wore in her home country, rows of plaits that had small beads at their ends, criss-crossing across the top of her head. Then she rooted through Achilles' chest of stolen loot till she found what she was looking for: a gold head-dress with some black pearls attached. She snapped off some of the curlicues, bending the soft metal into shape before giving it to Dunni to place carefully on her head. Then the slave woman outlined her upper lids with black kohl and darkened the three dots on her neck.

"Do I look ...?"  
"You look like a queen," Dunni said. "A _real_ queen."  
 _One of our queens,_ were the words unspoken.  
Relta smiled at her and nodded, the pearls rustling against the metal. She felt the need to go to Agamemnon dressed as her true self, not some Achaean incarnation. She wanted to kill him as a woman of her own shores, and not a Greek.

Achilles came in, a robe wrapped around his waist, his body glistening with fragranced oils and his hair slicked back. He stood stock-still when he saw her, seemed to think to say something, then stopped.  
"You do not look like a Kalion Queen," he said finally, pulling on his robe.  
He stared at her, amused or bemused – it was hard to tell.  
Dunni looked from one to the other, her eyes open wide, not even making an attempt at discretion.  
"Well, I'm not a Kalion queen."  
"If you are going to play dress-up, then I want you to look like a Phtian woman."  
"Don't you like it?" she replied.  
He shook his head.  
"You don't look like my woman."  
She bit her lip; looked at the ground.  
 _Maybe I'm not your woman,_ she thought.  
"And I really don't think you need the cloak," Achilles continued.  
He tugged out the pin and the cloak fell on the ground, then he loosened some of the plaits and removed the head-dress.  
Relta tried to push his hands away, but he plucked the improvised crown from her head and flung it on the bed.

"Wait," he said as she scrabbled to put it back on.  
He looked through one of his boxes and extracted a plain gold band, which he bent to fit her head. From its carvings, Relta knew it was Greek, maybe even from his homeland.  
"Much better," he said, then he started to pull at her chiton and she jerked away.  
"Don't," she said. "Leave it."  
"Greek women don't wear it like that."  
That was enough.  
"Do I _look_ like a Greek woman?" she asked lightly, warningly.

Achilles smiled, cupped her face in his hands.  
"You do now," he said and kissed her nose. "Come, my sweet, and let us pay homage to that pig."  
She glanced at Dunni as she left the tent, made a small movement of her head.  
The slave woman leapt forward, licked the pad of her thumb and swiftly wiped the three black dots off the back of her neck.

Fine, Relta fumed. Maybe it was better not to draw attention to herself by looking - how had Odysseus put it? out-landish. Maybe it would be easier to get closer to Agamemnon dressed as a modest Greek woman, a meek consort and respectful subject. As long as she got to see him choke on his own vomit, what did it truly matter what she wore?


	34. 34

"Go, there," Achilles whispered and nodded at the low table at the back.  
Relta looked around: Agamemnon had turned the deck of his boat into a large hall, tented over with canvas. Beneath her feet the wooden planks were covered with sumptuous rugs and a throne was set beneath a canopy at one end of the room. To the left and right of it were lesser chairs, and on either side of the boat was a long table with space for four more men. A fire in a small brazier burned brightly in the middle of the improvised room, to take the chill out of the night air, and at the far end of Agamemnon' hall was a low table, around which a small group of women had arranged themselves, sitting cross-legged on the floor. 

"I can't stay with you?"  
"No," he said, lowering his forehead to touch hers, "you sit with the women. Go. Be pleasant. They're nice."  
Relta gathered her cloak and pushed her way gently through the throng of people gathered, waiting for Agamemnon's entrance. She caught Odysseus' eye and he grinned at her; Phoenix saw her and inclined his head regally.  
"Who are these women?" she hissed to Dunni in their mix of Gaulish and island dialects.  
"They are the concubines of the kings," the slavewoman replied. "They left their proper wives in Greece, you see, so these are their camp-wives. Like you," she added helpfully.

Relta's stopped in front of the women's table and her breath caught, unsure, shy, stared at by the small group of enquiring faces.  
"I'm Relta," she said, as the women looked at her expectantly. "I'm ... with Achilles."  
"You're Achilles'?" one of the women repeated, the subtle correction was greeted with nodding from the other women. Relta considered contradicting her, but knew it was neither the time, nor the place to assert any semblance of the independence she thought she was entitled to.  
So she nodded, tried to look humble.  
A woman with high, arched brows and a long nose that dominated her narrow face moved and made space on the cushion next to her.  
"I am Elida, wife of King Patenos, now I am Phoenix' woman," she said.

And, to Relta's disquiet, each of the women around the table, all noble-born, introduced themselves by referring to their status in their previous lives – daughter of Prince This, wife of Lord That, Sister of the Governor of There – before naming the king they currently called master.  
_It's no wonder they see me as Achilles' property,_ she thought. _There are no freewomen in this camp. They're all slaves._  
"And Agamemnon?" she asked. "Does he have ... have a consort?"  
They looked at her with embarrassment. One of the women, a young girl wearing a blond wig probably from the hair of the shorn head of some northern slave, tittered behind her hand.  
"He would only take a queen," Elida said kindly. "But there aren't too many of us in camp."

A trumpet sounded and everyone hurried to their places, except Achilles, who sauntered across the room, reaching his chair just as Agamemnon entered.  
The women stood with bowed heads.  
"He wanted you, you know," Elida whispered. "He had you lined up, even though you were only from a paltry kingdom and not of noble lineage. Lucky for you, Achilles claimed you first."  
She raised one of her beautiful brows even further, giving Relta a knowing glance.

"Sit, sit," Agamemnon roared. "Tonight we celebrate the beginning of the end. Tomorrow my brother will launch an attack that will drive that pup Prince Hector back to his bloody gates – and it won't be long before we bloody those bloody gates!"  
There was some polite laughter at his little pun, but Relta had the feeling that this boasting of victory had been promised and heard far too often by the assembled kings and generals.  
"We drink to victory!" he bellowed angrily, annoyed by the lack of enthusiasm. "Are you with me, my friends? Are you with me?"  
Relta saw Achilles glance at Odysseus, suppressing the grin that played about his lips.  
The Myrmidon raised his goblet with the others and shouted "To victory!" before sitting down and pretending to straighten his robe.

They all sat and the room was soon filled with the hum of chatter.  
Looking around, Relta saw that many of the men were weary, hiding yawns behind their fingers and picking at the dishes in a desultory fashion. From her vantage-point on the floor, she saw Odysseus' leg, stretched awkwardly out under the table, wrapped in a bandage that had a small streak of blood seeping through. His face was lined with care as he tried to make polite conversation with Nestor.  
He caught her eye and smiled, exhausted.

The food was served – to the men first. Platters of meat and fish were passed around; fruit and vegetables cut into elegant slivers were brought to the tables by slave girls. The women at the low table were served lesser cuts of meat and those vegetable slices probably not considered good enough for the men. Relta picked a few pieces for her plate, watching Agamemnon as she did. How would she, without attracting notice, get from her place on the floor at the back to the hall to his table at the front? She discreetly patted the band of cloth around her ribs and felt the hardness of the little vial of poison.

"You're not hungry?" Queen Elida asked.  
"No, I don't have much of an appetite," Relta said.  
"Upset stomach?" Elida asked. "Or ... in the family way?"  
She smiled at Relta, winked at her. "They say northerners are good breeding stock. The slaves certainly produce many children. I'm sure Achilles' sons with you would be strong: great warriors."  
Relta felt winded.  
"I – I –" she began, and she was rescued by another woman, who leaned over and slapped Elida playfully on the wrist.  
"Naughty Elida! Leave her be!"

"The men all look very tired," Relta said quickly, changing the subject.  
"And why wouldn't they be?" Elida replied. "The only ones with any energy to feast are the ones who did not fight."  
The woman who had come to Relta's aid hissed in warning: "Elida!"  
"What?" the queen said. "I speak the truth, do I not?"  
And she nodded at the dais, where Menelaus and Agamemnon were tucking into their plates of meat, ripping the flesh from the bones with their stubby fingers.

The hum of conversation continued as the people at the banquet ate their fill.  
Some of the men pushed their plates away, rested their cheeks in their hands, trying to stifle their yawning as the tent grew warmer and the hour later. Luckily Elida's attention was drawn away by the woman in the blond wig, who had started complaining bitterly about being robbed by her maid.  
"The problem is," she said in a low tone, "those wenches do not respect my authority. I am Ajax' woman, he is the greatest warrior that ever lived. And what do they do? They steal my bangles!"  
The slavewomen gathered the dishes and started to clear away.  
"And you, do you have problems with your woman?" Elida asked Relta, startling her from her thoughts.  
"My slave? No, no, she's fine. I think. I don't know if she's robbed me – I don't have much to rob!"  
Her attempt with humour was met with blank stares from the other women, as though this were not something one boasted of in public.

Agamemnon stood and clapped his hands.  
"This, my friends, is no ordinary feast. We cannot celebrate victory before Zeus has granted it, but we can celebrate our unity as a great army – the greatest our world has ever seen."  
There was polite applause.  
"So there is no music, there are no bards, for this is a breaking of bread before we go to our beds and beat those Trojans back tomorrow. But for a little entertainment I am sure we have time."  
He looked around, peering through the brazier smoke.  
"Where is the Queen of the Kalions?" he said loudly.  
Elida elbowed her and Relta rose slowly, a sense of dread filling her.  
"Here."  
"Step forward, woman!"

She stepped forward, moving close to where Achilles sat.  
He was upright in his seat, one hand on the backrest, ready to jump up.  
"Well, what is your skill, witch?" Agamemnon boomed, his voice brittle with fake bonhomie. "Apart from your ability to conjure up storms?"  
"My skill, king of kings?"  
"They say you were a fortune-teller before Kalii fell in love with your pretty face. Do you tell fortunes?"

She glanced at Achilles and he frowned. She couldn't tell what that frown meant so she looked back at Agamemnon's smug face and stammered,  
"Yes, sire, my mother and I read, used to read the runestones, sire."  
"What are runestones, pray tell?"  
"They are stones, sire, with special markings. Symbols."  
Agamemnon raised a sceptical eyebrow, but a germ of an idea took hold inside her.  
"Each symbol represents something and what a person picks usually tells their fortune, their future," she said in a louder voice. She looked around. "My people, we can divine the messages of the gods."  
"The messages of the gods!" Menelaus roared with laughter. "Aye!"  
"Of _her_ gods," Achilles said quickly. "Not ours."

She looked at him again, he shook his head, a tiny shake, but she ignored it.  
"Of my gods," she confirmed.  
"Well, throw your little stones down on the table, woman, and tell me what your gods think of the king of kings," Agamemnon said.  
"I don't have them with me," she said.  
"Tell your woman to fetch them," Agamemnon countered.  
"I hid them for safekeeping."  
"Then go get them. We can wait."  
There was an unsubtle groaning among the men.  
"My king," she said, bowing her head low. "I hear that your men would rather be in their beds, preparing for tomorrow's battles, than listening to the ramblings of a northern seer. But tomorrow evening, after your next victory, my skill will be at your service."

Achilles cleared his throat loudly but she didn't dare look at him.  
"At my service!" Agamemnon said in delight. "Well, I like the sound of that. In that case, good witch, let us repair to bed, for victory tomorrow is sure. Your little stones can tell me whether we will storm Troy before the eve of Chronos or Helios so my slaves can prepare the appropriate sacrifice."  
She bowed. "Of course, king of kings."

They were dismissed.  
Achilles marched her back down the sand, through the whipping wind. She pulled her cloak around her shoulders, glad of its warmth.  
"Have you lost your mind?" he shouted, pushing her through the door. " _I'm at your service, Agamemnon,_ " he mimicked in a high-pitched voice. "Why not serve yourself on a platter, woman?"  
"I thought it best to get on his good side," she said placatingly. "We will have to share a beach with him for some time to come."  
Achilles laughed hoarsely.  
"Share a beach with him ... So your little stones aren't going to tell him of a great victory, then, my witch?" he asked sarcastically.  
"My little stones are going to give him a very ambiguous prognosis of victory," she replied. "There will be victory, but the gods aren't sure when."  
"And if he wants more than your forecast?" Achilles frowned. "If he calls for you and you alone, what will you do then?"  
"I can take care of myself," she said. "He wouldn't be the first man I held off."  
Achilles stared at her. She often wondered what he was thinking, his blue eyes serious, and face immobile.

"What?" she said finally, annoyed.  
"You are up to something," Achilles said. "I know you well enough. Do you plan to kill him? Run away again?"  
"Achilles!" she said.  
She didn't have to feign shock; she was unable to deny it and lie to his face – he would know, that much she was sure.  
He sat at the edge of the bed.  
"It's true, isn't it? You want to kill him and run away again. You think you can traverse half the world to find your child and go back to your homeland. Do you even know if the girl is alive? Children die all the time – and a girlchild is weak."

She said nothing, but her heart started beating rapidly in panic.  
Achilles seemed to sense her fear and continued relentlessly: "What age were you when you left? Ten, eleven? It's no more your home than it is mine. You have been in Greece longer than you ever lived there. Who will you go back to? What will be there for you when you return?"  
His voice was low and steady, but his eyes blazed.  
"It's the home of my ancestors," she said weakly. "I need to go back."  
"You'll go back to those stinking, damp shores and you will immediately realise that you miss Greece and all its beauty. Take my word for it."

He was right.  
Of _course_ , he was right.  
"If you don't die on the way there, you will die there alone. Under your grey sky, in your green grass, in your cold rain," he spat.  
"Achilles," she said, her eyes filling with tears. "My mother named me for the star of the north. I can't help me if it pulls me home."  
"You have no home."  
"I do. I have a home, I have my people. And I have my child. My mother walked out and left me to my fate and I won't leave my child to hers."

He was silent, leaning back on his elbows to look up at her as she stood by the bed,  
"Who is her father?" he asked. "The child's? Was it the peacock king?"  
"It doesn't matter – " Relta began but he interrupted her.  
"It does to me," he said. "I want to know."

She licked her dry lips.  
"When we were on Crete, I met a man, a foreigner. He was married and he loved his wife, but we were... drawn to each other. I cannot explain it. We spent a night together and the next day he rejected me. He said I was a whore and I had bewitched him somehow."  
Achilles raised an eyebrow as her voice faltered. "And then you became pregnant? And you didn't know who the father was?"  
Relta laughed bitterly.  
"Oh, I did," she said. "He was the captain of the guard of a visiting king. And when that visiting king took a fancy to my mother and me, the captain was charged with making sure we got to Kalios safely."

Yanis: standing upright, one step behind her, as she walked to the throne-room in her wedding finery, the robe hiding the small swell of her belly. Kalii had not minded, not one bit – he had no intention of impregnating her himself and a little one would give her something to do, he'd said, when she had confessed her condition.

"Did this soldier know it was his child?" Achilles asked.  
"I don't know. Apart from court pleasantries, we never spoke alone again. Until," she laughed abruptly at the memory, "he rode into battle after me and pulled me away from a Phoenician spear. Then I got an earful."  
Achilles continued to look at her silently and she felt compelled to fill the silence.  
"He never looked at me again, Achilles. He was scrupulously polite and obedient in every way, but he never once met my eye."  
"Sometimes we can't do the things we want, in case someone realises how much we want them," the Myrmidon said.  
Relta shrugged.  
"He behaved as though my Ana was Kalios' child and maybe he was able to persuade himself that she was."

Achilles heaved himself up.  
"To bed," he said. "We can discuss this in the morning."  
"We are..." she paused, looking for the words. "We are at peace?"  
"At peace?" Achilles repeated coldly. "With what? The fact that you intend to leave me at your pleasure and go gadding off to Carthage? Certainly, my lady, I am not at peace with that."  
"Achilles," she said, placing a hand on his arm. "I'm not going to run away, I promise. But the time will come when I have to leave you."  
As in: soon, she thought. Tomorrow.  
She looked up at his face, the broad jaw, full lips and the eyes that were the same shade as her own. The golden one, beloved of the gods.  
He shook off her arm.

Did she love him? she wondered as he turned his back and stripped for bed. He back bore the indentations of her fingernails, marks of the love they had made.  
So they'd made love – but did she love him?  
She turned it over in her mind like a pebble: no, loving him had never been an option. It had never come into question. She could not love him. It was impossible.

"Do you love me, Achilles?"  
The question popped out before she could stop it.  
He wouldn't look at her, just flung his robe on the floor.  
"I'm tired," he said. "I have no desire to discuss this further."

She crawled into bed beside him, hugging its edge. A gulf separated them and she knew from his breathing that he lay awake. She longed to turn and reach out a hand, touch his warm back, press her body against the length of his. But she couldn't; that would be a capitulation of sorts and she was doing her best to resist.  
_Sometimes we can't do the things we want, in case someone realises how much we want them,_ she thought and covered her face with her hands in the darkness.

xXx

Relta fell asleep in the inky black of night, long after Achilles' even breathing had signalled that he was sleeping. She didn't wake when he left the tent. Instead she stirred when she moved in her sleep and a shot of pain awoke her.

She sat up but her leg was gripped fast. She yanked back the cover and saw that her ankle was wrapped in a strip of cloth, around which was a shackle. She pulled the chain and found it was affixed to the leg of Achilles' heavy bed.  
"The bastard!" she cried. "Achilles! Achilles!"  
Dunni popped her head around the door of the tent.  
"Yea," she said sympathetically. "I told him you wouldn't be best pleased."  
"Where is he? Why did he chain me up?"  
"They're at battle, queen. And he chained you up so's you wouldn't run away. Were you planning on running away?"  
"None of your business, Dunni," she snapped.

The bigger woman approached the bed and sat down on the edge, settling her broad backside comfortably on the embroidered cover.  
"If I help you," she said, "can I come, too?"


	35. 35

Timon met Achilles when he was a boy.  
Timon's father was the palace carpenter, so one day the young prince turned up at the door of his workshop, trailed by his elderly tutor.  
"My papa said you can make me a wooden sword," the little blond boy said haughtily.

Timon had looked up and looked over the boy with barely disguised distaste.  
The king's son was wearing a snow-white chiton, his head a riot of curls. He looked like a girl. Timon, nearly seven, was covered in dust and smudged with charcoal; he was already allowed his own knife to whittle little animals out of wood.  
The prince looked like a boy whose nursemaid held the knife for him to cut his peach and apple into tiny, princely chunks.

"Aye, my prince," said Timon's father with the barest of nods. "But you'll have to wait till I'm finished this piece for your mother, my lady queen."  
Timon's father was carving a crib for the new baby princess. After so many miscarriages and stillbirths, the queen would not have a crib carved until the baby had been born and lived a three-month. Now the palace carpenter was working day and night, carving and sanding a bed fit for the much-longed-daughter who laughed lustily and waved her fat little arms in the air.

"But I want it now," said the boy. "I want to learn how to fight with a proper sword."  
"Then you will have to learn how to wait first," said the carpenter, not even looking at the child.  
"But I want it _now,_ " the boy repeated, his blue eyes icy.  
"Go ask your mother what I should do," the carpenter said, looking up. "Ask her what is more important. If you come back and tell me that she says I should put this aside to make you a sword, I will."  
The prince hesitated on the threshold and looked up at his tutor.  
The old man looked down at him, his face amused.  
"Do you need to ask your mother what is more important?" the old man said.  
"No," the prince said sulkily.  
"Then you have learned something important here today, haven't you? Thank Master Carpenter for his patience and get back to the palace. It's nearly midday and this man is busy."  
The blond boy glanced at Timon, who stood silently beside a pile of wood, knife in hand.  
"Thank you, Master Carpenter," he said hollowly, eyeing Timon's knife with naked envy.

The blond boy left the workshop, dragging his feet, and didn't return until his little sister had been installed in her brand-new bed. And when he came back, Timon's father had a wooden sword waiting for him, just like the one he'd made his own son.

The two boys became friends.  
When Achilles' lessons were over, he came running down to the workshop yard, swinging his wooden sword. The smith's boy, Eudorus, joined them and the three boys played on the woodpile, made pretend ships out of off-cuts and catapults from tree branches. Achilles was generous to a fault – he had grown up knowing no want for anything, so he shared everything he had with the other boys and gave them anything they admired. More than once Timon's father had to send valuables back to the palace: if Achilles need something to slide down the steep side of the quarry on, he simply took one of his mother's gold platters and let every child in the neighbourhood have a go.

The boy was full of mischief and always had some naughty plan up his sleeve, and he managed to charm most of the palace staff with a shake of his blond curls. The women doted on him, feeding him and his friends apples and honeycakes. Timon had always been a skinny little chap, but after befriending Achilles, his growing frame gained a little padding from all the treats Achilles managed to snag. Although the prince was naturally the group leader, Timon was prone to bucking under the other boy's authority. Eudorus, a year younger, followed his lord without question, but Timon had been born with a stubborn streak and every now and again, he felt compelled to beat the shit out of his friend, just to show him that he would take orders from no-one, especially not a snot-nosed princeling.

"Aren't you going to stop them?" the tutor would ask when he came to collect his charge and found him rolling around in the dust, swinging punches at the carpenter's boy.  
"Nah," Timon's father would say. "When he goes out into the big world, he's going to encounter a whole lot of men who'll want to kick his arse. Might as well practise defending himself now."  
Then he'd wade in, grab the two boys by the scruff of their necks and throw them apart, aiming a kick at each backside.  
"See you tomorrow, Timon!" Achilles would cry cheerfully, scampering up the path to the palace, the fight already forgotten.

As they grew, Eudorus and Timon were allowed to practise with Achilles, to learn how to use the sword, the shield and the spear – the boy needed partners to train with after all, and Achilles found them preferable to the sons of the Phtian lords that his father had lined up for him. The three boys grew into gangly thirteen-year-olds and it quickly became evident that Eudorus and Achilles would be far better warriors than Timon ever could be; not that he minded: he still gave Achilles an arse-kicking every now and again, just to show him what he thought of him.  
Then, one day, he noticed that Achilles was outstripping him in strength and speed, and a simple throw that would have once winded the blond boy was now easily countered and blocked.  
After that, Timon didn't feel like kicking his arse that much any more.

Other things changed, too.  
Achilles was still doted upon by the palace women, but something was different. The serving women were looking at him with new eyes.  
One day Timon noticed how one of the maids watched his friend pass, eyes downcast, but as soon as he had walked by, she looked him up and down, her small pink tongue darting out to lick her upper lip. Before, Achilles would have responded with a howl of outrage when they teased him about it, now when Timon told the story, he just shrugged.  
" _Women_ ," he said in a wordly way that made Timon wish he could still beat the shit out of him.

Then, suddenly, Achilles left.  
Without a word, he was gone.  
Eudorus said that King Peleus had caught him with a serving girl – the same one? Timon wondered, the one who licked her lips when he passed? – and the boy had been packed off to King Phoenix of the Dolopians, a wise man who would turn the unruly boy into a proper man.  
A real warrior. A future king.

And that was the last Timon saw of him, till nearly twelve years later.  
He was standing in his father's workshop, bent over the plane, shaving the smooth strait of a piece of wood, when a shadow blocked his light.  
"Move it," he growled, "Before I kick your arse."  
"You might want to think about that," said an unfamiliar voice. "The last time you tried, it didn't end well for you."

In the doorway stood a blond man, a broad grin on his handsome face, a helmet tucked under his arm.  
Behind him, Timon recognised the bright eyes of Eudorus, smiling broadly from ear to ear.  
"Come on," Achilles said. "Come with us and have adventures."  
Timon straightened up and looked at the other two.  
Achilles held out a black helmet and Eudorus gave him a round black shield.  
"Come on," Achilles said, as though they were twelve again. "Hurry up, Timon."

xXx

Timon was not the best soldier, not much of a warrior. He had a knee that tended to give way at the most inconvenient times, leaving him hobbling like an old man. Achilles never mentioned it. He seemed to always have something for Timon to do that didn't involve being in the front line of battle. It was never discussed, it just was that way.

Which is probably why, after a day on the battlefield, covered in minor wounds and limping on a swollen knee, Achilles had pulled him aside in the early morning as the Myrmidons were assembling. The prince looked him up and down, clapped a hand on his shoulder and said gruffly,  
"You stay here. I've chained the queen to the bed and she's not going to be happy when she wakes."  
"You've chained her to the bed?" Timon repeated incredulously. "Why?"  
"She wants to make a run for it again," Achilles said brusquely. "She stays here."

Timon rolled his eyes and made no effort to hide it. Achilles frowned at him.  
"Did Eudorus tell you about her people?" Timon asked.  
"About her people? Eudorus? No," Achilles said, his head whipping around.  
"Well, he got talking to a Spartan whose brother-in-law had actually travelled up to the northern isles and this fellow told him all about them – he said that the people up there are wilder than animals. They all wear their hair in those crazy little braids, they paint their faces blue like demons, Achilles."  
Achilles began, "What has that got to do with – "  
"And the women fight, he said. They ride on their horses with their men into battle. They had queens as powerful as any of our kings – one queen had a whole army of female warriors."  
"So? These are tales told around a campfire."  
"She's like a wild animal, Achilles. You can't keep her here if she doesn't want to stay. I thought you had learned that already. You already let her go."  
"And she came back."  
"And she's trying to leave again."

Timon took a deep breath and patted his childhood friend roughly on the shoulder.  
Achilles flinched beneath his touch.  
"She won't stay, my lord. Let her go. If she really is a she-wolf, you can't keep her as your pet."  
"She'll die if I let her go," Achilles said bleakly. "She has nowhere to go – it's here or Troy. So unless you have a better idea, you keep her in that tent until I have time to deal with her."  
"But – "  
"Timon, I'm not asking you as a friend, I'm telling you as your lord. Make sure that woman does not leave the tent. When she wakes and finds out what I have done, she will be fit to kill. You've been warned."  
Achilles turned on his heel and started to walk through the wet sand to where Eudorus stood patiently on the chariot.  
"That's an order," he said, pointing a finger at Timon.

xXx

Timon found the queen and her attendant on the floor of the tent, scrabbling in the sand at the foot of the bed. When he entered, they looked up guiltily.  
"That bastard prince of yours chained me up," she said, her pale cheeks pink with exertion. They'd been trying to move the heavy bed but hadn't succeeded and she rattled the chain at him accusingly. "Do you have a key to this?"  
"No, my lady," he said.  
It was strictly true: he didn't have a key but he could have opened it with a pin, however he wasn't going to tell her that.  
"Dunni, get me that shawl pin over there. I'll see if I can poke it open."  
"No, no," Timon said, swooping in to pick up the shawl pin before the big Gaul woman could grab it. "Leave the lock be, my lady. Achilles said you are to stay here till he comes back and I will see to it that you do."  
"I order you to release me!"  
"I'm Achilles' man, my lady," he said regretfully. "I do what he tells me."  
"Then you're a bastard, too," Relta snapped. "Just come a bit closer so I can smack the back of your head."

Timon declined, laughing.  
"I'll be outside if you need me," he said.  
Then he found a shady place outside and picked up a piece of soft wood and his whittling knife, trying to ignore the sound of battle that swept down over the dunes in waves.

xXx

By afternoon, the sun was beginning to lower and the men started to return.  
"What news?" Timon shouted.  
It seemed that they were straggling back, slow-footed and defeated.  
"Same as yesterday," one man said dully. "No winner. No loser, either. But we lost more men, those Trojan shits come out for the slaughter and pull back in behind their walls. Agamemnon keeps promising reinforcements. Do you see them on the horizon? No, neither do we."  
The man spat blood on the sand.  
"And the Myrmidons?" asked Timon. "What of them?"  
"Ask 'em yourself," the warrior said gruffly and jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

Eudorus came thundering down the beach in Achilles' chariot.  
Alone.  
Behind him, some of the men limped, held each other up. Patroclus came behind him, his face a picture of worry.  
"Where's Achilles?" Timon shouted, cold fear gripping his heart.

"He's fine," Eudorus said, slapping the horse's rump as a servant led it away. "It's Odysseus. He shouldn't have fought, took a sword through the leg yesterday. But he said he had to set an example for his men, now he's fucked for sure. Achilles is with him – don't know if he'll make the night."  
"You're joking?"  
"I wish I were, old friend. He took a sword here –"  
Eudorus indicated his gut.  
"Bound to happen. The Trojans are toying with us, picking us off, bit by bit."  
Timon sighed.

He heard the queen's voice calling him over the din on the beach and made his way slowly to the tent. She sat on the edge of the bed, her face worried and white.  
"He's all right," Timon answered her unasked question. "But Odysseus is in a bad way."  
The queen covered her mouth with her hands.  
"Achilles is with him now, my lady. I don't know when he will return, but I'm sure you understand."  
She nodded dumbly.

Two guards appeared in the doorway behind him.  
"What do you want?" snapped Timon.  
"Her," one of them said.  
"Who wants her?"  
"The king of kinds," said one of the guards in a sing-song voice. "King Agamemnon requests her presence."  
"She's not going. Achilles said she was to stay in the tent."  
"Achilles can fuck himself," the first guard said rudely. "If his king tells him to jump, Achilles says 'How high?' Now hand her over. The king doesn't care to wait."  
"She's Achilles' woman," Timon said hotly. "I'm not just giving her to Agamemnon."

"Timon, Timon, it's all right," she interrupted. "Agamemnon just wants me to read his runestones."  
She jangled a little bag at him, tipped the stones out into her palm for him to see. "That's all. Achilles knows. They discussed it at the banquet last night. Achilles knows, I promise."  
"You're not lying, my lady?"  
"No, he knows, I swear."  
She held her hands up in a gesture of innocence.

Timon came closer and pulled the shawl pin out of his waistband. She tut-tutted as he used it to open the lock.  
"My lord Achilles would not let you go if he were here," Timon whispered.  
"He would have no choice," she said in a low, firm voice. "He is just as much Agamemnon's servant as you are his."  
"Then I'll go with you."  
"You stay here and wait till Achilles comes back," she whispered. "I'll take Dunni. She's as tough as any man. She'd have no qualms about boxing Agamemnon's ears if he tries anything untoward."  
She looked at him, her eyes serious.  
"Stay here, Timon," she said patting his arm.

She stood up and straightened her chiton.  
"I need a couple of minutes to get ready," she said. "Timon, call Dunni, will you? And you two can kindly wait outside."  
She snapped her fingers and the two guards retreated.  
Timon sent a young lad to the serving quarters and he returned with Dunni, shuffling up the beach wrapped tight in a rough cloak against the evening wind.  
Men were still returning; the dusky air was filled with the smell of blood and sweat.  
The queen emerged wearing a plain chiton and carrying a heavy cloak. In her hand she held a leather pouch.  
"All my magic trinkets," she smiled at Timon.  
He bowed at her as she began to follow the two guards. After a couple of paces she stopped and walked back to him, her head down, looking at the sand.

When she reached him, she looked up, her blue eyes studying his face for a second or two.  
"Tell Achilles ... tell him not to worry about me," she said and squeezed his arm.

Then she turned again and left.


	36. 36

"Wait," Agamemnon commanded when the guard announced her.  
Relta paused at the entrance to his quarters, her fingertips flying to the hard shape of the vial tucked into the waistband of her robe.  
"He's bathing," the guard whispered.  
 _Ugh,_ she thought and considered turning on her heel to leave.  
"You may come in," the king said in an imperious tone.  
"If that old pig is naked, I'll vomit," Dunni said in her ear.

Luckily, though, Agamemnon was not naked. On the contrary, he was wrapped up tight in a costly robe, a thick band of embroidered material knotted around his waist.  
 _He knows I've seen Achilles naked,_ Relta thought, suppressing a smirk as she dipped into a deep curtsey. _It's not in his best interests to have me draw a comparison._  
"Oh, come closer," Agamemnon said crankily.  
He waved a whooshing hand at the servants and they scurried out quickly, shooting pitying glances at the two foreigners.  
"That goes for you as well," he said to Dunni, who just looked at him blankly.  
"Doesn't she speak Greek?" snapped Agamemnon.  
"No, not a word," Relta lied glibly.  
"Fine, she can stay then," he said and sank down on his throne.  
It stood behind a table that still glistened from the cloth that had wiped it after his meal. He signalled to Relta to sit opposite him.

Agamemnon leaned back in his chair and surveyed her wearily.  
"You need not fear me, girl," he said. "I have no intention of incurring Achilles' wrath, not when I need him up and fighting for me at sun-up." He looked at her slyly. "He still harbours a suspicion that I was somehow behind the murder of his little slave woman. Me! The king of kings, as though I had nothing better to do than slay slaves!"  
Relta bowed her head.  
"Of course not, my lord king," she murmured.  
"Speaking of the devil, where is he now?"  
"He is with Odysseus, my lord king," she said meekly. "The men say he is in a bad way and may not survive the night."  
Agamemnon sighed deeply, seeming to deflate to half his size as he did so.  
"Aye, Odysseus," he said sadly.  
They sat in silence for a moment or two, Relta waiting for him to speak, as was proper protocol.

Finally, stirring himself out of his thoughts, Agamemnon said,  
"Well, witch, have you got your magic stones with you?"  
Wordlessly, she reached into her pouch and pulled out the little cloth bag, tipping the runestones out on to the table. Agamemnon examined them carefully, plucking a handful and turning them over to look at the carvings. He stood and fetched a jug of wine and returned to the table with it and two goblets. Relta's fingers flew once more to the vial.

"Pour," he commanded, and she did.  
"How does this work?" Agamemnon said, grabbing his cup. He did not wait for her to be seated again, but drank a long draught.  
"Normally the person wishing insight asks a question and then turns over three stones, usually in a row like this, from north to south, then four more, two on either side of the central stone, east to west. Then the seer must interpret the stones as they are turned."  
"And you have the sight?" he sneered.

Relta smiled wryly.  
 _No one has the sight,_ she wanted to say.  
Sometimes the stones seemed to produce an uncannily accurate combination, but she was not stupid enough to think the finger of Danu had flipped them into place. No, it was luck. And if the combination was not exactly perfect – well, she could twist most stones' meaning into something that worked.  
"People say I have the sight," she said modestly.  
It was not a lie. People _did_ say that, after all.

Agamemnon drained his cup and smacked it down on the table.  
Relta slipped the vial out of her waistband and hid it in the folds of her skirt.  
"What do you wish to ask?" she prodded gently.  
"When will my reinforcements arrive?" Agamemnon said.  
"Your reinforcements?" she repeated, buying time.  
"Yes," he thundered. "No need to ask if we will break down the walls of Troy, we all know that is a foregone conclusion. No, I want to know when my damned reinforcements will arrive. The men say they saw lights on the horizon during the last storm a few days ago – but where are they? Where are my ships, my men?"

She heard her mother's voice in her ear: Drama! You must give them a little bit of theatre.  
Relta closed her eyes, raised her hands palms up and said in her own tongue,  
"Mother Danu, guide me in your wisdom."  
Behind her, Dunni snorted and hid it with a cough.  
Relta slowly placed her open hand on the stones, then pushed them to the king.  
"I will point at the stones you must turn," she intoned solemnly. "We start with your past – "  
"No, I want to know about my present. I need to know when my men will arrive from the mainland."  
"As you wish, my lord king," she said in the same solemn tone and waved her hands once again over the stones.

Agamemnon glanced at her, impressed, then selected his runes, laying them out as instructed, glancing up at her to see if he was doing it correctly, as eager as a child to get his schoolwork right. She nodded regally at him and he turned the runes on either side of the central stone over.

"These stones represent the now," she said. "Here you have the stone that represents water, the elemental spirit. It usually signals a journey or the return of a traveller from overseas. However, this other one represents ..."  
She chuckled, a low laugh, fingering the white stone.  
"This is the stone of the ash, it signals joy or celebration, usually the arrival of good news. To me, this is an indication that your reinforcements are on their way, soon to arrive."  
"How soon?" he asked, the pitch of his voice higher.  
"The stones don't give me times or dates," she said, smiling at him. "This is what you have laid bare: good news will arrive by water very soon. The stones say this is your present, your near future."

Agamemnon sat back, beaming.  
"And the other stones?" he asked. He leaned back in his chair and waved an arm expansively. "I have no interest in my past. It's done now; I am a man who lives in the present, who looks to the future."  
"Then I will divine your present and your future," she said, smiling at him with the same fake smile.

He turned over two runes, starting at the bottom, leaving the central stone in the cross pattern unturned.  
"This is where you find yourself right now," she said, touching the polished white surface of the lowest stone. "This is the stone of ..." she searched for the Greek word. "... cattle."  
" _Cattle?_ " Agamemnon spluttered. "What need have I for cattle?"  
"This stone represents great wealth," she explained. "In our country, the kings and queens own huge herds of these beasts, they are worth their weight in gold, some of them."  
She smiled at him again and he was mollified.  
"Great wealth, well, that's true. And more to come when Troy crumbles before me."  
"No doubt," Relta murmured placatingly. "This one here is the stone of the elder tree, the one that represents your ancestors and your family. What you have been given by your fathers and forefathers; what you will pass to your children. This is a very powerful combination, lord king, they signify a dynasty of which men will speak for hundreds of years."

Agamemnon preened.  
"Witch!" he cried, full of good humour, "I brought you here to tell me something I did _not_ know!"  
He chuckled and raised his empty glass, peering into it almost comically.  
"Pour me more, woman," he ordered and pushed the goblet at her.  
 _This is it,_ she thought. _This is my chance._  
Her heart began to thump wildly, banging loudly in her chest.

"Sire," she said, trying to keep the shake from her voice, "the last three stones represent your destiny. Not your future, not your present, but your destiny as a man. You must concentrate hard, focus on them and turn them slowly, starting with the top-most rune and finishing with the middle one, the one that represents your destiny, your fate."  
He nodded, leaned forward and stared at the stones.  
Relta uncorked the vial under the table and held it in her left hand as she poured the wine from the jug.

Agamemnon turned over the first stone.  
 _The stone of the spear,_ she thought, _the rune that represents victory._  
But the symbol was upside-down: a victory that could not be, or a victory that would not be as expected.  
She placed Agamemnon's goblet behind the jug as he turned over the second stone, slowly and carefully, his brow furrowed in concentration.  
The thorn, she thought, _the thorn that sticks in the foot of man, the sharp pain of loss._  
Relta tipped the contents of the vial into the wine. It was a dark colour and it sat on the surface of the wine like oil.  
 _Shit,_ she thought. _Curse you, Hector. What kind of potion is this?_

Agamemnon looked up at her expectantly and she nodded at the middle stone.  
"Offer a thought to your gods that you have chosen wisely," she said in a soft voice, "Before you turn it over."  
Obediently, the king shut his eyes for a moment and she spontaneously plunged her finger into the goblet and mixed the poison quickly. It disappeared in the dark wine, swirling into the scarlet liquid.

The central stone, the stone of the king's destiny, made her catch her breath.  
"Well?" he asked and reached out his hand for the goblet.  
She handed it over.  
"The top two stones are just as auspicious as the others," she said, trying to sound sincere. "They represent victory and loss – "  
He opened his mouth to protest.  
"If combined with the stone of victory," she said quickly, "we are speaking of the losses incurred by the vanquished."  
 _And if the rune is upside-down,_ she thought, the losses will be Agamemnon's. _Like a thorn in his side, they will build up until he cannot bear it any more._

"Ah!" he crowed and raised his goblet triumphantly.  
Relta beamed at him.  
Outside, there was shouting and Agamemnon looked around.  
No!, she thought. Drink the damned wine, man!  
"To victory!" Relta cried and grabbed her cup.  
"What is going on?" he said as the shouting became louder.  
Desperate, she cried, "King of kings, we should toast your victory!"  
Dunni behind her made a shuffling sound as they heard the sound of feet running up the wooden gangplank that led to Agamemnon's quarters on his boat.  
"My lord," she said loudly, "we must toast your victory."  
He looked at her distractedly.   
"I have more important things to do," he snapped, "but I will drink to the victory you have foreseen."  
He swigged from the cup and looked up as the curtain that covered the entrance was thrown open.

Achilles stood in the doorway, resplendent in his black armour, his helmet jammed under his arm.  
He looked from Relta to the Achaean king.  
"Hector attacks," he said curtly. "The men are in disarray, they are gathering arms as we speak but Hector's archers have come close enough to take out the sentries and the first men over the dunes."  
"God's teeth!" Agamemnon roared, smashing the goblet down on the tablet, upsetting the wine and sending it across the table, leaving the stones in a pool of blood-red liquid.  
Relta cried out, but Agamemnon ignored her.  
"Where is my brother?" he shouted.  
"He is putting on his armour," Achilles said, approaching the table.  
Relta tried to hold back tears, gathering up the wet stones, the red wine splattering her chiton like blood.  
"Leave the stones, queen," Achilles said quietly.

"Get me my servants!" Agamemnon roared at the guards. "My armour! My sword, my shield! Light the torches up and down the beaches so that we may see what this bastard has planned for us!"  
"The Ithacans are putting Odysseus on board his boat," Achilles said. He paused. "With your permission, a small crew will leave with him now, so that he may die honourably beneath the stars and not lying at the feet of some lowly Trojan."  
"Fine, fine," Agamemnon said. "A handful of men, mind. The Ithacans will fight, regardless of whether their king lives. If Odysseus perishes, they will fight on for me. Tell them that, Myrmidon."  
"Yes, sire," Achilles said.  
He held Relta tightly by the arm. She grabbed her pouch, tried to scoop up the runestones but Achilles pulled her away, out of Agamemnon's quarters, followed by Dunni, whose arms were full with her cloak and her queen's. As they hurried down the gangplank, Menelaus passed them and growled at Achilles to leave his damned witch and get his men.

"I told you – " Achilles began.  
"Listen," she interrupted. "Listen to me: tonight Agamemnon will die."  
"Is that what your stones said?" he hissed, bending his face to hers.  
They could hear arrows whizzing and some of the dry brush on the dunes was starting to burn, tainting the night sky with an acrid smell.  
She shook her head.  
Achilles frowned, uncomprehending.  
"I poisoned him," she said, a wave of hysteria rising in her. "I put poison in his wine."  
"Where did you get poison?" he said in disbelief.  
She hesitated.  
 _Oh, why bother?_ Relta thought. _This is it, this is the end. The end of all things._

"I made a deal with Hector," she said. "I promised to kill Agamemnon – to end this war, Achilles. With Agamemnon dead, you would all return to your homeland and Troy would be left in peace."  
"And you, would you return to your homeland?" he asked.  
The sky was cloudy, she could barely make out the expression on his face.  
"Hector said he would put me on a boat to Carthage if I killed Agamemnon," she said. "That was the deal. But he must have become impatient - "  
She could hear fire crackling, a gust of wind blew smoke towards them and the sound of metal clashing.  
"And you poisoned him? With the wine? The same wine that spilled all over the table?"  
"He drank some," Relta said, doubt rising. "He drank deeply – surely enough to kill him?"  
"Have you seen how big he is?" Achilles said. "It would take more than a mere sip of poison to kill him."

She cried out again, this time in frustration and despair.  
"He will be sick," Achilles said, starting to walk off. "That's all."  
She ran after him, Dunni scurrying behind them.  
Achilles spoke to her over his shoulder.  
"He will probably be sick and he will know that it was poison. So he'll know it was you. If we survive the night, the first thing he will do is round you up and have you killed. Possibly slit your throat. Maybe let his men rape you first, just to teach me how to control my women in future. That is, if he lets me live. He'll probably suspect that I put you up to it."  
He stopped and looked down at her, his face impassive.  
Relta covered her face with her hands.

"This will incapacitate him," she said, looking up. "He will be too ill to fight well. Tonight will be the night he dies."  
Achilles shook his head silently but she said with more confidence than she felt: "It will. I know it will."

"My lord!"  
It was Eudorus, running up the beach, Achilles' sword and shield in his hand.  
"The men await their orders, my lord!"  
He looked down at her, then raised a hand to her cheek.  
She flinched, but he gently placed a cool palm against her jaw, cradling her face.  
"You would risk everything. You would make a deal with Hector, just to get away from me," he said sadly. "Do you want to leave me that badly?"  
She felt tears well up and bit her lip to hold them in, but he looked at her, waiting for an answer.  
"I don't want to leave you," Relta answered. "It's just that – it's just that I can't stay."  
"But I love you," Achilles insisted.

Relta smiled at him, and in doing so, a tear ran down her cheek. She wiped it away quickly.  
"You don't love me _enough_ ," she said. "I'm not your destiny, Achilles. Another woman will make you happy. Another woman will give you peace in this time of war. Not me. It was never me."

Eudorus stopped beside them, looking from one to another.  
Dunni cleared her throat nervously behind them as an arrow hit the canvas of a tent at the edge of the dunes and lit it like a bonfire.  
Achilles took his sword and shield, looked out over the sea, thinking.  
She waited, studying his face, trying to memorise it.  
"Where's Timon?" he asked.  
In answer, Eudorus turned and let out a piercing whistle, which was returned from the darkness.  
Achilles looked down at her, fixing his blue eyes on hers.  
"You will board the boat with Odysseus," he said. "If he dies, they will make for the nearest port on the mainland, his body will be embalmed there and taken on to Ithaca for burial rites. You can either take your chances on the mainland or travel to Ithaca and find a boat there."

The shouts grew shriller, more panicked; the wind blew a billow of smoke down the beach. The crackling grew louder and the penned animals started to low and bleat plaintively in the darkness. Some of the children were crying as their mothers tried to make their way down the beach, away from the advancing army.  
"My _lord_ ," Eudorus implored impatiently.  
"Have you gold, my lady?" he asked her, ignoring his captain, placing his helmet on his head.  
She shook her head.  
"Take what you want of mine," Achilles said. "Timon will put you and your woman on board the boat."  
Timon, out of breath, appeared beside them in time to hear his orders. He nodded.

"Goodbye, then, my queen," he said without emotion. "I wish you well."  
Achilles stood upright, sword and shield in hand, then nodded at her slowly and walked away.  
She watched him, his familiar gait, the muscles of his back, his long fingers gripping the sword, disappearing into the smoky night.  
"I did love you!" she called out, suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling she had not wanted to know.  
"But not enough," came his reply from the darkness.  
She raised her hands to her face again.  
Her cheeks were wet with tears.

xXx

The boat pushed off as the first wave of Trojans came over the top of the dunes. The men rowed as fast as they could while the sails were being raised. The wind was blowing over the beach, out to sea. A wind that was favourable for the sailors, but deadly for the Greeks defending the sand.  
Below decks, two male slaves were tending Odysseus, who was raving with fever, conversing with the gods and negotiating his price across the Stix.

From the deck, Dunni and Relta could hear the screams, hear the scratching metal of the swords, till the wind changed and blew the sound of the horror over the northern sea.  
"It's hopeless, isn't it?" Dunni said bleakly. "The Greeks will be driven back into the water."  
Relta nodded numbly.  
The Ithacans on the board the boat paused in their work to look at the blinking lights of the battle on the sand. Relta heard them whisper to their gods and one of them shouted, "White Queen! If you are a witch, use your magic to help the Greeks."  
She looked at Dunni in despair.

There was no sound but the swish of the waves, the battle reduced to a bare hum, then suddenly one of the sailors screamed: "There! There!"

Around the head of the bay they saw a light, a small row of lights.  
"It's a boat!" one of the men shouted in terror. "The Trojans - the Trojans have them trapped!"  
The sailors and the two women rushed to the other side of the boat, clamouring to see.  
Another boat appeared, then the flickering lights of a third.  
"That's not a Trojan flag," the Ithacan captain said suddenly. He put his hand over his eyes, squinting in the darkness. "They're Greeks!"  
The lights flashed a greeting to the other boat and the Ithacans roared into the wind.

Agamemnon's reinforcements.  
Relta felt a wave of ice wash over her: fear? Relief?  
She did not know.  
The men on board the Ithacan boat raised a cheer, the rowers paused to cheer with them.  
"Row on!" the captain cried. "Row on, our comrades will be saved! The White Queen has saved them!"

The Ithacan boat cut swiftly through the waves and Relta made her way to a quiet corner, her legs weak. She crumpled into a heap, her back against the side of the boat.  
"The rune stones said that Agamemnon's reinforcements would arrive," Dunni said. "You were right."  
Relta nodded. She felt a wave of nausea rise.  
"And will Agamemnon win a great victory?" the Gaul asked.  
"No, no, he won't. I lied. He will lose – I just don't know if it will be tonight. But the king of kings will not leave Troy alive."  
"Is that why you left the Myrmidon behind?"

Relta pressed her eyes closed, saw her daughter's face, her little arms reaching up for her. The yellow dress.  
"No," she said. "I didn't think ... I didn't think I was to stay. Then that pig king turned over the last stone, his centre stone, and I knew for sure."  
"What was it?"  
" _Mór-Rígan_ ," Relta answered, but Dunni shook her head.  
"What's that?"  
"The one we call the high queen, the ghost queen," Relta said.  
" _Mara-Rigu!_ " Dunni cried in recognition, sitting up.  
Relta opened her hand and showed the slave woman the stone she had been clutching, her palms bloodied from her fingernails.  
"Yes, _Mara-Rigu_. See this symbol here? That's her symbol, the wolf."  
Relta laughed out loud, a bitter, harsh laugh that made a nearby Ithacan look up.  
"The stinking wolf, the animal that haunts me," she said to Dunni. "Apparently, I wasn't meant to affect Achilles' destiny, I was meant for Agamemnon."

She spat on the stone, then tossed it over her shoulder, in a high arch over the side of the boat.


	37. 37

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> That's it. My Trojan saga comes to an end.   
> Please comment and/or leave kudos - I appreciate knowing that someone's reading along.

_Eight years later_

Timon looked down at the coin in his hand and then back up, shading his eyes against the sun.   
Many things were odd in this country, the fact that the sun stayed high in the sky after evening had fallen was only one of them. The midsommer month, _Meitheamh_ as they called it here, was when the sun seemed to refuse to set till well after bedtime. It was evening but children were playing in the fields around the _rath_ , the fenced ring-fort that rose out of the landscape in the clearing, stopping to stare at the small group of strangers who rode up on their horses.

"We will stay the night here if they welcome us," Aristaes said softly, nodding at Timon.  
His master had made it clear that their journey to the high king would involve no detours on that wild goose chase to find a mythical Greek queen that had escaped the beach of Troy to return to her homeland, but he had a kindly heart and saw how much it meant to his manservant, even if he did not believe that the woman existed.

At every village they stopped in, at every rath – the fenced enclosures in which the local chieftains built their townships – they spent a night or two, Timon used his few words of their savage language to try to get some information: "Rua – " pointing to the nearest red-haired person (and there was always a red-haired person nearby) "Banríon?" – a queen – "Relta?"  
Then their guide filled in the gaps in his imperfect description but the locals shook their heads, their faces curious. The dark-skinned foreigners were on their way to the high king, to the druid astronomers of the valley of the river Bóinne, and looking for some woman they said was a queen. It was enough to draw inquisitive villagers from miles around.

Then, one morning as they loaded up their horses at dawn, a young lad came riding up the rough trail to the village they had stayed in. He shouted something at them, his face red with exertion.  
Timon shrugged, looked around for the guide, who was nowhere to be seen.  
The boy slid off his horse and handed him a small piece of folded leather. The Greek opened it and found a coin inside: a Myrmidon coin, with the faint image of Peleus. On the leather, wobbly, unsure and imperfect, were inked the letters:  
ἀστήρ  
Timon could not read much but he knew what they meant: _star_.  
He'd grabbed the guide and the boy drew them a map in the mud with a stick to show them where to go. Aristaes had sighed but had agreed that they could continue that journey and visit that chieftain en route.  
If it meant that much to Timon.

And now, high evening approaching, the farm workers were all at supper and only the naughty children were still out playing in the fields, trying to avoid being called for bed. The _rath_ on the hill looked relatively prosperous, the fences were in good repair and the roofs they could see were well-thatched.

"Ask them if she lives here," Timon said to his guide.  
The man called out something to the children and they pointed at the gate of the rath.  
Timon's heart began to thump.  
"She's up there, your queen," the guide said, in his oddly-accented Greek.  
Timon clicked his tongue and the horse hurried forward.

At last.

xXx

It was her, no doubt.  
She stood as calmly as she had the first time he had seen her in that Kalion temple, nearly a decade ago. Back then she had worn a simple white chiton; now she wore a woollen tunic and a heavy cloak the same reddish colour as her hair, held in place by one of the broad gold bands he had seen on chieftain's wives and higher-ranking women. Like most of her fellow countrywomen, her hair was braided back in small plaits that were interwoven and it was still the same strange colour:  
 _No, not strange_ , he thought. _Here it was not strange at all._

She saw him approach and she seemed to freeze, the way she used to do whenever he mentioned Achilles.  
She stared at him silently, almost incredulously, as he trudged up the path to the centre of the _rath_.

As he approached, a huge man came out of one of the bigger houses and stood beside her. He was a full head taller than the White Queen and his hair and beard were as dark as Timon's own, but streaked with grey. He beamed at the visitors and raised his hand in greeting, then bent his head to say something to Relta. She nodded and stepped forward.

"Timon," she said hoarsely.  
She stopped, seemed to search for the Greek words. "You are ... you are welcome, my old friend."  
"Thank you, my queen," he answered, bowing.  
She laughed, more of a gasp than a laugh. "I'm not a queen, nor have I been for a long time," she said. "In fact, I never really was."  
Timon stepped forward and put out his hand.  
"You were a queen to me," he said.

She grasped his hand in both of hers and shook it, then introduced him to the tall man.  
"This is my husband, the ... the head of the – we call it the _clan_ : the tribe? He is like a very, very small king in Greece," she said, then laughed, covering her mouth with her hands. "Oh Timon, I have no Greek words any more."  
"It's fine," he said. "I'm just glad I found you."  
"I'm glad you found me, too," she said and then repeated it for her husband.  
He roared with laughter and slapped Timon cheerfully between the shoulders, almost knocking him over.  
"What did he say?" the Greek asked fearfully.  
"He said we will feast in your honour," she said. "And then you can tell me ... everything."  
She smiled at him and then glanced down, as though she were almost fearful of everything he might tell.

xXx

There was feasting, but far more modest and much less wild than some of the dinners Timon and the Greek party had experienced. Relta's household was small but the food was good. There was a bard, who sang cheerful songs that Timon didn't understand and her husband made a speech that Relta translated into halting Greek.

She introduced her children: three small boys. The biggest of the three had her red hair, the younger ones were dark like their father. Her daughter was a young lady, who shyly welcomed them in broken Greek, then stepped behind her mother. She was dark-eyed, dark-haired, like any maiden from Greece, except she wore a green woollen tunic like her mother and wove her hair into those elaborate knots.

When the food had been served and those present had relaxed into comfortable chatter, Relta pulled her chair closer to his.  
"Tell me, Timon," she said, grinning. "How on earth did you get here?"  
He glanced anxiously at her large husband, who was engaged in a lively discussion with their guide and a bewildered-looking Aristaes.  
"Will your husband – will your husband mind you speaking to me alone?" he asked.  
She snorted dismissively, a gesture that was familiar to him from the beach of Troy.  
"We are not in Greece now, Timon," she said teasingly. "Women can tell their men to jump in a lake over here."  
"I've seen them in battle," he said with a smile. "I would well believe it."  
He leaned back.

"Aye... how did I get here? Well, Achilles sent us home before they broke the walls of Troy," Timon said.  
He glanced at her and she seemed to flinch at the mention of his name.  
"All of us. He would not have us lose our lives for Agamemnon . So I went back to Phtia and when I heard that it was all over, the siege, well... I went down a dark path, my lady, I don't mind admitting it. Drank a lot, so I did. Then a few years ago Aristaes took me in because he was looking for a boatsman, a carpenter. He said he was going north – and I thought, why not? I've always wanted to see where you savages come from."  
They both laughed and Relta pushed him, mock-indignantly.

They were silent for a moment, then she said,  
"He is dead, isn't he?"  
He nodded.  
"Aye, he is. Four years back, now."  
She bit her lip, looked away.  
"And he died in Troy?"  
"Aye, my lady, they finally breached the walls, thanks to Odysseus' cunning. But he didn't survive the battle."  
"So Agamemnon took Troy in the end?"  
"No, my lady, he died in the fight, too."

She laughed out loud, a bitter laugh.  
"So it was all for nothing? He died for _nothing?_ "  
Timon hesitated.  
"Not exactly, my lady. There was a woman – Achilles went to save a woman. He loved her, he did."

She turned her head away, so he could not see her face. When she looked back, she said, "At least that, then."  
Relta smiled at him, but the smile did not reach her blue eyes.  
"He loved you, too, my lady. I think he would have died for you as well."  
"I don't know," she said. "We ... we would have ended up hating each other, I think. We were too alike in many ways, too proud and too stubborn. I would have walked into the waves one day and drowned myself, just to get away from that damned beach. I couldn't stay there."  
"Well, I never doubted that you would find your way home," he said sincerely.

The White Queen glanced at him.  
"Didn't you?" she said lightly. "Well, it took me long enough. Odysseus spent two nights at death's door, but recovered by the time we reached the coast, the bastard."  
She laughed sarcastically.  
"If he had died, I would've got to Ithaca, but he managed to pull himself out of the Styx and then he wanted to go back to Troy. I tried to talk him into deserting, no, he had pledged his fealty to that pig king, so back he went. Thankfully not before Dunni and I were set down on the mainland and from there we found a boat to Carthage."  
She closed her eyes, remembering.  
"We got Ana and the four of us, Cano, Dunni, Ana and I spent a very unpleasant winter there before we found a boat out in spring. It took us months to get home."  
She shook her head, wordlessly.  
"Months and months and _months,_ " she said bleakly. "Cano died before our first voyage was over. Dunni stayed behind in Breton, she had had enough."  
"But you made it," Timon said.  
"We did."

She laced her fingers together.  
"Before I left, he told me that I would get here and I would realise how much I really loved Greece. I'd left here as a child, after all, Greece was all I knew. And he was right: I was as foreign and strange and outlandish here as I ever was in Greece. My father was dead, so I found shelter with my clan – with a half-brother I had never known. And this country, this country that I remembered as being so perfect, such a paradise, became my new prison. My personal Troy."  
Relta inclined her head, looking at him in that questioning way of hers.  
"Because, of course, nothing is as perfect as you remember it, is it?"  
Timon shook his head.

He drank his ale and tried to think how to best frame his next question.

"Your – eh, your leaving," he began awkwardly. "Your leaving – do you regret it?"  
She was quiet for so long that he thought she might not have heard the question.  
"No," she said finally. "My husband is a good man and I love him dearly. He took in my children and we've made a good life together. This is where I am meant to be, under the northern star. I wasn't made for Greek beaches."  
She nodded to herself.

"But I missed him," she said, standing up.  
She took up the ale jug, a sign the conversation was over.  
"At first I missed him and that feeling was like a bleeding wound, raw around the edges for a long time. All wounds heal eventually, though. I'm glad to hear he found happiness."  
She smiled at him again, that same brittle smile.  
Timon raised his fingers to touch hers but at that moment, he caught her husband's eye and discreetly dropped his hand.  
"He did love you, my lady, he truly did."  
"Do you think so? He let me go, after all."  
"He loved you enough to let you go," Timon said. "He wanted you to be happy, didn't he? He let you leave, even though Agamemnon nearly had him whipped for it."  
Relta stared at the handle of the jug and a slow grin lit up her face.  
"Was Agamemnon angry? You know I tied to poison him, don't you?"  
"Aye, I do. He vomited all over his horse that night. The men laughed about it for months. If Achilles hadn't been his star warrior, the king of kings would've had the skin flayed from his back."  
"Bastard king," she swore.  
"Aye," Timon agreed, a broad grin splitting his face. "A proper bastard, all right."

She stood, poured him some ale.  
"Give me a little time, Timon," she said. "I need ... a little time, then I will come back and you must tell me about the fortunes of the other men."  
She smiled at him, then ducked her head and walked off, empty ale jug in hand.

When she came back, her eyes were a little reddened but she smiled and laughed, enquired about the other men, flinching each time he mentioned a death.   
She did not say Achilles' name, he noted.   
Not once did she say his name.

xXx

The White Queen stood by as they saddled the horses, wrapped up in her russet cloak.  
Her husband, the dark-haired giant, shouted orders at the workmen and farmhands who were yawning, getting ready to start a day's work. Children were already running in and out between the houses, and her red-headed little boy was swinging a wooden sword with fury, shouting something that sounded quite ferocious to Greek ears. His playmates scampered.

Relta said farewell to the other travellers, then her husband stepped forward to do the same.  
She turned away so she could speak to Timon.  
"Thank you for finding me," Relta said.  
Timon fumbled in his pouch and withdrew the scrap of leather and the silver coin.  
"How did you come by this?" he asked as he handed it over.  
"It was in amongst the coins Odysseus gave me," she replied. "Ahma had one just like it, so I knew it was his father. I kept it, as a ..."  
She searched for the word.  
"As a talisman?" Timon supplied.  
"Yes, that's it."  
She smiled and moved forward to pat his horse.  
"What's the boy's name?" he said, nodding at him.  
"They call him Rua," she said. "It means – "  
"Red," finished Timon. "Because of the hair."  
"Yes, that's right."  
"They call him Rua. And you - I know in secret you call him Pyrrhus, don't you?" he asked teasingly.  
Her eyes widened.

"How do you know?" she said.  
Timon straightened his saddle, laughing.  
"Lady, do you take me for a fool? How old is he, seven? Eight? Last night you said your husband took in your _children_. Your daughter ... and your eldest son, am I right?"  
She nodded dumbly, then cleared her throat and said, "He was born on ship off the Breton coast. I thought for sure we would die, but here we are. Your gods always favoured him, so it stands to reason they would favour his son."

They watched the boy. He held the little sword with an instinctive ease and already moved with a lightness of foot that would someday mark him as a great warrior.  
"Aye," Timon said. "Look at him. Look at him wield that sword. I saw his father wield a wooden sword at the same age and he was every bit as wild."  
Relta laughed.  
"That boy will break my heart," she said, "Just like his father did."  
"Will you promise me that you will tell him who he is?" Timon asked. "Will you tell him stories of his father, the greatest warrior Greece has ever known?"  
"When the time comes," she said, lowering her voice as Aristaes looked over, "I will make sure he knows he is Pyrrhus, son of Achilles, son of Peleus."

Aristaes cleared his throat.  
Timon hesitated, unsure, but she took a step closer and embraced him.  
"Take care," she said.  
"Send him to me when he is a man," Timon said spontaneously. "Send him to Greece. He will take his place in Phtia."  
She laughed and smacked the horse's rump.  
"We'll see," she said. "I won't promise anything. He might be needed here."

She stayed at the gate of the rath, her hands folded neatly, watching them without moving till they rounded a bend in the road.   
When they came out of the clearing on the other side, Timon glanced back up but the figure at the gate was gone.


End file.
